THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 
OF  CALIFORNIA 


PRESENTED  BY 

PROF.  CHARLES  A.  KOFOID  AND 
MRS.  PRUDENCE  W.  KOFOID 


LIFE  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA 


BY   LADY   BARKER, 

AUTHOR   OF 

STATION   LIFE  IN  NEW   ZEALAND,"   "STORIES  ABOUT,"  ETC.,  ETC. 


PHILADELPHIA 
J.    B.    LIPPINCOTT    &    CO. 

1877. 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1876,  by 

J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  &  CO., 
In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress,  at  Washington. 


JJI 


LIFE  IN  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


CAPE  TOWN,  October  16,  1875. 

SAFE,  safe  at  last,  after  twenty-four 
days  of  nothing  but  sea  and  sky,  of 
white  -  crested  waves  —  which  made  no 
secret  of  their  intention  of  coming  on 
board  whenever  they  could  or  of  tossing 
the  good  ship  Edinburgh  Castle  hither 
and  thither  like  a  child's  plaything — and 
of  more  deceitful  sluggish  rolling  billows, 
looking  tolerably  calm  to  the  unseafar- 
ing  eye,  but  containing  a  vast  amount  of 
heaving  power  beneath  their  slow,  un- 
dulating water-hills  and  valleys.  Some- 
times sky  and  sea  have  been  steeped  in 
dazzling  haze  of  golden  glare,  sometimes 
brightened  to  blue  of  a  sapphire  depth. 
Again,  a  sudden  change  of  wind  has  driv- 
en up  serried  clouds  from  the  south  and 
east,  and  all  has  been  gray  and  cold  and 
restful  to  eyes  wearied  with  radiance  and 
glitter  of  sun  and  sparkling  water. 

Never  has  there  been  such  exceptional 
weather,  although  the  weather  of  my 
acquaintance  invariably  is  exceptional. 
No  sooner  had  the  outlines  of  Madeira 
melted  and  blended  into  the  soft  dark- 
ness of  a  summer  night  than  we  appear- 
ed to  sail  straight  into  tropic  heat  and  a 
sluggish  vapor,  brooding  on  the  water 
like  steam  from  a  giant  geyser.  This 
simmering,  oily,  exhausting  temperature 
carried  us  close  to  the  line.  "  What  is 
before  us,"  we  asked  each  other  languid- 
ly, "  if  it  be  hotter  than  this  ?  How  can 
mortal  man,  woman,  still  less  child,  en- 
dure existence  ?"  Vain  alarms !  Yet 


another  shift  of  the  light  wind,  another 
degree  passed,  and  we  are  all  shivering 
in  winter  wraps.  The  line  was  crossed 
in  greatcoats  and  shawls,  and  the  only 
people  whose  complexion  did  not  resem- 
ble a  purple  plum  were  those  lucky  ones 
who  had  strength  of  mind  and  steadiness 
of  body  to  lurch  up  and  down  the  deck 
all  day  enjoying  a  strange  method  of 
movement  which  they  called  walking. 

The  exceptional  weather  pursued  us 
right  into  the  very  dock.  Table  Moun- 
tain ought  to  be  seen — and  very  often  is 
seen — seventy  miles  away.  I  am  told  it 
looks  a  fine  bold  bluff  at  that  distance. 
Yesterday  we  had  blown  off  our  last 
pound  of  steam  and  were  safe  under  its 
lee  before  we  could  tell  there  was  a  moun- 
tain there  at  all,  still  less  an  almost  per- 
pendicular cliff  more  than  three  thou- 
sand feet  high.  Robben  Island  looked 
like  a  dun-colored  hillock  as  we  shot 
past  it  within  a  short  distance,  and  a 
more  forlorn  and  discouraging  islet  I 
don't  think  I  have  ever  beheld.  When 
I  expressed  something  of  this  impression 
to  a  cheery  fellow-voyager,  he  could  only 
urge  in  its  defence  that  there  were  a  great 
many  rabbits  on  it.  If  he  had  thrown 
the  lighthouse  into  the  bargain,  I  think 
he  would  have  summed  up  all  its  attrac- 
tive features.  Unless  Langalibalele  is 
of  a  singularly  unimpressionable  nature, 
he  must  have  found  his  sojourn  on  it 
somewhat  monotonous,  but  he  always 
says  he  was  very  comfortable  there. 
3 


WITHDRAWN 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


And  now  for  the  land.  We  are  close 
alongside  of  a  wharf,  and  still  a  capital 
and  faithful  copy  of  a  Scotch  mist  wraps 
houses,  trees  and  sloping  uplands  in  a 
fibry  fantastic  veil,  and  the  cold  driz- 
zle seems  to  curdle  the  spirits  and  ener- 
gies of  the  few  listless  Malays  and  half- 
caste  boys  and  men  who  are  lounging 
about.  Here  come  hansom  cabs  rattling 
up  one  after  the  other,  all  with  black 
drivers  in  gay  and  fantastic  head  and 
shoulder  gear ;  but  their  hearts  seem 
precisely  as  the  hearts  of  their  London 
brethren,  and  they  single  out  new-com- 
ers at  a  glance,  and  shout  offers  to  drive 
them  a  hundred  yards  or  so  for  exorbi- 
tant sums,  or  yell  laudatory  recommen- 
dations of  sundry  hotels.  You  must 
bear  in  mind  that  in  a  colony  every  pot- 
house is  a  hotel,  and  generally  rejoices 
in  a  name  much  too  imposing  to  fit 
across  its  frontage.  These  hansoms  are 
all  painted  white  with  the  name  of  some 
ship  in  bright  letters  on  the  side,  and  are 
a  great  deal  cleaner,  roomier  and  more 
comfortable  than  their  London  "for- 
bears." The  horses  are  small  and  shab- 
by, but  rattle  along  at  a  good  pace ;  and 
soon  each  cab  has  its  load  of  happy 
home-comers  and  swings  rapidly  away  to 
make  room  for  fresh  arrivals  hurrying  up 
for  fares.  Hospitable  suggestions  come 
pouring  in,  and  it  is  as  though  it  were  al- 
together a  new  experience  when  one  steps 
cautiously  on  the  land,  half  expecting  it 
to  dip  away  playfully  from  under  one's 
feet.  A  little  boy  puts  my  thoughts  into 
words  when  he  exclaims,  "  How  steady 
the  ground  is  !"  and  becomes  a  still  more 
faithful  interpreter  of  a  wave-worn  voy- 
ager's sensations  when,  a  couple  of  hours 
later,  he  demands  permission  to  get  out 
of  his  delicious  little  white  bed  that  he 
may  have  the  pleasure  of  getting  into  it 
again.  The  evening  is  cold  and  raw 
and  the  new  picture  is  all  blurred  and 
soft  and  indistinct,  and  nothing  seems 
plain  except  the  kindly  grace  of  our  wel- 
come and  the  never-before-sufficiently- 
appreciatcd  delights  of  space  and  silence. 

OCTOBER  17.     , 

How  pleasant  is  the  process  familiarly 
known  as  "looking  about  one,"  particu- 


larly when  performed  under  exception- 
ally favorable  circumstances !  A  long 
and  happy  day  commenced  with  a  stroll 
through  the  botanic  gardens,  parallel 
with  which  runs,  on  one  side,  a  splendid 
oak  avenue  just  now  in  all  the  vivid 
freshness  of  its  young  spring  leaves. 
The  gardens  are  beautifully  kept,  and 
are  valuable  as  affording  a  sort  of  ex- 
perimental nursery  in  which  new  plants 
and  trees  can  be  brought  up  on  trial  and 
their  adaptability  to  the  soil  and  climate 
ascertained.  For  instance,  the  first  thing 
that  caught  my  eye  was  the  gigantic 
trunk  of  an  Australian  blue-gum  tree, 
which  had  attained  to  a  girth  and  height 
not  often  seen  in  its  own  land.  The  flora 
of  the  Cape  Colony  is  exceptionally  va- 
ried and  beautiful,  but  one  peculiarity 
incidentally  alluded  to  by  my  charming 
guide  struck  me  as  very  noticeable.  It 
is  that  in  this  dry  climate  and  porous  soil 
all  the  efforts  of  uncultivated  nature  are 
devoted  to  the  stems  of  the  vegetation : 
on  their  sap-retaining  power  depends  the 
life  of  the  plant,  so  blossom  and  leaf, 
though  exquisitely  indicated,  are  fragile 
and  incomplete  compared  to  the  solidity 
and  bulbous  appearance  of  the  stalk. 
Everything  is  sacrificed  to  the  practical 
principle  of  keeping  life  together,  and  it 
is  not  until  these  stout-stemmed  plants 
are  cultivated  and  duly  sheltered  and 
watered,  and  can  grow,  as  it  were,  with 
confidence,  that  they  are  able  to  do  jus- 
tice to  the  inherent  beauty  of  penciled 
petal  and  veined  leaf.  Then  the  stem 
contracts  to  ordinary  dimensions,  and 
leaf  and  blossom  expand  into  things 
which  may  well  be  a  joy  to  the  botanist's 
eye.  A  thousand  times  during  that  shady 
saunter  did  I  envy  my  companions  their 
scientific  acquaintance  with  the  beautiful 
green  things  of  earth,  and  that  intimate 
knowledge  of  a  subject  which  enhances 
one's  appreciation  of  its  charms  as  much 
as  bringing  a  lamp  into  a  darkened  pic- 
ture-gallery. There  are  the  treasures  of 
form  and  color,  but  from  ignorant  eyes 
more  than  half  their  charms  and  won- 
ders are  held  back. 

A  few  steps  beyond  the  garden  stand 
the  library  and  natural  history  museum. 
The  former  is  truly  a  credit  to  the  Colony. 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


Spacious,  handsome,  rich  in  literary  treas- 
ures, it  would  bear  comparison  with  sim- 
ilar institutions  in  far  older  and  wealthier 
places.  But  I  have  often  noticed  in  col- 
onies how  much  importance  is  attached 
to  the  possession  of  a  good  public  library, 
and  how  fond,  as  a  rule,  colonists  are  of 
books.  In  a  new  settlement  other  shops 
may  be  ill  supplied,  but  there  is  always 
a  good  bookseller's,  and  all  books  are  to 
be  bought  there  at  pretty  nearly  the  same 
prices  as  in  England.  Here  each  vol- 
ume costs  precisely  the  same  as  it  would 
in  London,  and  it  would  puzzle  ever  so 
greedy  a  reader  to  name  a  book  which 
would  not  be  instantly  handed  to  him. 

The  museum  is  well  worth  a  visit  of 
many  more  hours  than  we  could  afford 
minutes,  and,  as  might  be  expected,  con- 
tains numerous  specimens  of  the  Bok 
family,  whose  tapering  horns  and  slen- 
der legs  are  to  be  seen  at  every  turn  of 
one's  head.  Models  are  there  also  of 
the  largest  diamonds,  and  especially  well 
copied  is  the  famous  "Star  of  South 
Africa,"  a  magnificent  brilliant  of  purest 
water,  sold  here  originally  for  something 
like  twelve  thousand  pounds,  and  resold 
for  double  that  sum  three  or  four  years 
back.  In  these  few  hours  I  perceive,  or 
think  I  perceive,  a  certain  soreness,  if 
one  may  use  the  word,  on  the  part  of  the 
Cape  Colonists  about  the  unappreciative- 
ness  of  the  English  public  toward  their 
produce  and  possessions.  For  instance, 
an  enormous  quantity  of  wine  is  annual- 
ly exported,  which  reaches  London  by  a 
devious  route  and  fetches  a  high  price, 
as  it  is  fairly  entitled  to  do  from  its  ex- 
cellence. If  that  same  wine  were  sent 
direct  to  a  London  merchant  and  boldly 
sold  as  Cape  wine,  it  is  said  that  the 
profit  on  it  would  be  a  very  different 
affair.  The  same  prejudice  exists  against 
Cape  diamonds.  Of  course,  as  in  other 
things,  a  large  proportion  of  inferior 
stones  are  forced  into  the  market  and 
serve  to  give  the  diamonds  that  bad 
name  which  we  all  know  is  so  fatal  to  a 
dog.  But  it  is  only  necessary  to  pretend 
that  a  really  fine  Cape  diamond  has 
come  from  Brazil  to  ensure  its  fetching  a 
handsome  price,  and  in  that  way  even 
jewelers  themselves  have  been  known 


to  buy  and  give  a  good  round  sum,  too, 
for  stones  they  would  otherwise  have 
looked  upon  with  suspicion.  Already  I 
have  seen  a  straw-colored  diamond  from 
"Du  Zoit's  pan"  in  the  diamond-fields 
cut  in  Amsterdam  and  set  in  London, 
which  could  hold  its  own  for  purity,  ra- 
diance and  color  against  any  other  stone 
of  the  same  rare  tint,  without  fear  or  fa- 
vor;  but  of  course  such  gems  are  not 
common,  and  fairly  good  diamonds  cost 
as  much  here  as  in  any  other  part  of  the 
world. 

The  light  morning  mists  from  that 
dampness  of  yesterday  have  rolled  grad- 
ually away  as  the  beautiful  sunshine 
dried  the  atmosphere,  and  by  mid-day 
the  table-cloth,  as  the  colonists  affection- 
ately call  the  white,  fleece-like  vapor 
which  so  often  rests  on  their  pet  moun- 
tain, has  been  folded  up  and  laid  aside 
in  Cloudland  for  future  use.  I  don't 
know  what  picture  other  people  may 
have  made  to  their  own  minds  of  the 
shape  and  size  of  Table  Mountain,  but 
it  was  quite  a  surprise  and  the  least  little 
bit  in  the  world  of  a  disappointment  to 
me  to  find  that  it  cuts  the  sky  (and  what 
a  beautiful  sky  it  is  !)  with  a  perfectly 
straight  and  level  line.  A  gentle,  un- 
dulating foreground  broken  into  ravines, 
where  patches  of  green  veils  or  fields, 
clumps  of  trees  and  early  settlers'  houses 
nestle  cosily  down,  guides  the  eye  half- 
way up  the  mountain.  There  the  round- 
er forms  abruptly  cease,  and  great  gran- 
ite cliffs  rise,  bare  and  straight,  up  to  the 
level  line  stretching  ever  so  far  along. 
"  It  is  so  characteristic,"  and  "You  grow 
to  be  so  fond  of  that  mountain,"  are  ob- 
servations I  have  heard  made  in  reply  to 
the  carping  criticisms  of  travelers,  and 
already  I  begin  to  understand  the  mean- 
ing of  the  phrases.  But  you  need  to  see 
the  mountain  from  various  points  of  view 
and  under  different  influences  of  sun  and 
cloud  before  you  can  take  in  its  striking 
and  peculiar  charms. 

On  each  side  of  the  straight  line  which 
is  emphatically  Table  Mountain,  but  act- 
ually forming  part  of  it,  is  a  bold  head- 
land of  the  shape  one  is  usually  accus- 
tomed to  in  mountains.  The  "  Devil's 
Peak"  is  uncompromising  enough  for 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


any  one's  taste,  whilst  the  "  Lion's  Head  " 
charms  the  eye  by  its  bluff  form  and  deep 
purple  fissures.  These  grand  promon- 
tories are  not,  however,  half  so  beloved 
by  Cape  Colonists  as  their  own  Table 
Mountain,  and  it  is  curious  and  amusing 
to  notice  how  the  influence  of  this  odd 
straight  ridge,  ever  before  their  eyes,  has 
unconsciously  guided  and  influenced  their 
architectural  tastes.  All  the  roofs  of  the 
houses  are  straight — straight  as  the  moun- 
tain ;  a  gable  is  almost  unknown,  and 
even  the  few  steeples  are  dwarfed  to  an 
imperceptible  departure  from  the  pre- 
vailing straight  line.  The  very  trees 
which  shade  the  Parade  -  ground  and 
border  the  road  in  places  have  their  tops 
blown  absolutely  straight  and  flat,  as 
though  giant  shears  had  trimmed  them  ; 
but  I  must  confess,  in  spite  of  a  natural 
anxiety  to  carry  out  my  theory,  that  the 
violent  "  sou'-easters  "  are  the  "straight- 
eners"  in  their  case. 

Cape  Town  is  so  straggling  that  it  is 
difficult  to  form  any  idea  of  its  real  size, 
but  the  low  houses  are  neat  and  the 
streets  are  well  kept  and  look  quaint 
and  lively  enough  to  my  new  eyes  this 
morning.  There  are  plenty  of  people 
moving  about  with  a  sociable,  business- 
like air ;  lots  of  different  shades  of  black 
and  brown  Malays,  with  pointed  hats  on 
the  men's  heads :  the  women  encircle 
their  dusky,  smiling  faces  with  a  gay 
cotton  handkerchief  and  throw  another 
of  a  still  brighter  hue  over  their  shoul- 
ders. When  you  add  to  this  that  they 
wear  a  full,  flowing,  stiffly-starched  cot- 
ton gown  of  a  third  bright  color,  you  can 
perhaps  form  some  idea  of  how  they  en- 
liven the  streets.  Swarms  of  children 
everywhere,  romping  and  laughing  and 
showing  their  white  teeth  in  broadest  of 
grins.  The  white  children  strike  me  at 
once  as  looking  marvelously  well — such 
chubby  cheeks,  such  sturdy  fat  legs — 
and  all,  black  or  white,  with  that  amaz- 
ing air  of  independence  peculiar  to  baby- 
colonists.  Nobody  seems  to  mind  them 
and  nothing  seems  to  harm  them.  Here 
are  half  a  dozen  tiny  boys  shouting  and 
laughing  at  one  side  of  the  road,  and  half 
a  dozen  baby-girls  at  the  other  (they  all 
seem  to  play  separately) :  they  are  all 


driving  each  other,  for  "horses"  .is  the 
one  game  here.  By  the  side  of  a  pond 
sit  two  toddles  of  about  three  years  old, 
in  one  garment  apiece  and  pointed  hats : 
they  are  very  busy  with  string  and  a  pin ; 
but  who  is  taking  care  of  them  and  why 
don't  they  tumble  in  ?  They  are  as  fat 
as  ortolans  and  grin  at  us  in  the  most 
friendly  fashion. 

We  must  remember  that  this  chances 
to  be  the  very  best  moment  of  the  whole 
year  in  which  to  see  the  Cape  and  the 
dwellers  thereat.  The  cold  weather  has 
left  its  bright  roses  on  the  children's 
cheeks,  and  the  winter  rains  exception- 
ally having  this  year  made  every  blade 
of  grass  and  leaf  of  tree  to  laugh  and 
sing  in  freshest  green.  After  the  dry, 
windy  summer  I  am  assured  there  is 
hardly  a  leaf  and  never  a  blade  of  grass 
to  be  seen  in  Cape  Town,  and  only  a  lit- 
tle straggling  verdure  under  the  shelter 
of  the  mountain.  The  great  want  of 
this  place  is  water.  No  river,  scarcely  a 
brook,  refreshes  one's  eye  for  many  and 
many  a  league  inward.  The  necessary 
water  for  the  use  of  the  town  is  brought 
down  by  pipes  from  the  numerous  springs 
which  trickle  out  of  the  granite  cliffs  of 
Table  Mountain,  but  there  is  never  a 
sufficiency  to  spare  for  watering  roads  or 
grassplots.  This  scarcity  is  a  double  loss 
to  residents  and  visitors,  for  one  misses  it 
both  for  use  and  beauty. 

Everybody  who  comes  here  rides  or 
drives  round  the  "  Kloof."  That  may 
be ;  but  what  I  maintain  is  that  very  few 
do  it  so  delightfully  as  I  did  this  sunny  af- 
ternoon with  a  companion  who  knew  and 
loved  every  turn  of  the  romantic  road, 
who  could  tell  me  the  name  of  every 
bush  or  flower,  of  every  distant  stretch  of 
hills,  and  helped  me  to  make  a  map  in 
my  head  of  the  stretching  landscape  and 
curving  bay.  Ah  !  how  delicious  it  was, 
the  winding,  climbing  road,  at  whose 
every  angle  a  fresh  fair  landscape  fell 
away  from,  beneath  our  feet  or  a  shining 
stretch  of  sea,  whose  transparent  green 
and  purple  shadows  broke  in  a  fringe  of 
feathery  spray  at  the  foot  of  bold,  rocky 
cliffs,  or  crept  up  to  a  smooth  expanse 
of  silver  sand  in  a  soft  curling  line  of 
foam  !  "  Kloof"  means  simply  cleft,  and 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


is  the  pass  between  the  Table  Mountain 
and  the  Lion's  Head.  The  road  first 
rises,  rises,  rises,  until  one  seems  half- 
way up  the  great  mountain,  and  the  little 
straight  -  roofed  white  houses,  the  green 
velts  or  fields  and  the  parallel  lines  of 
the  vineyards  have  sunk  below  one's 
feet  far,  far  away.  The  mountain  gains 
in  grandeur  as  one  approaches  it,  for  the 
undulating  spurs  which  run  from  it  down 
to  the  sea-shore  take  away  from  the  height 
looking  upward.  But  when  these  are  left 
beneath,  the  perpendicular  walls  of  gran- 
ite, rising  sheer  and  straight  up  to  the 
bold  sky-line,  and  the  rugged,  massive 
strength  of  the  buttress-like  cliffs,  begin 
to  gain  something  of  their  true  value  to 
the  stranger's  eye.  The  most  beautiful 
part  of  the  road,  however,  to  my  taste, 
is  the  descent,  when  the  shining  expanse 
of  Camp's  Bay  lies  shimmering  in  the 
warm  afternoon  haze  with  a  thousand 
lights  and  shadows  from  cloud  and  cliff 
touching  and  passing  over  the  crisp  wa- 
ter-surface. By  many  a  steep  zigzag  we 
round  the  Lion's  Head,  and  drop  once 
more  on  a  level  road  running  parallel  to 
the  sea-shore,  and  so  home  in  the  balmy 
and  yet  bracing  twilight.  The  midday 
sun  is  hot  and  scorching  even  at  this  time 
of  year,  but  it  is  always  cool  in  the  shade, 
and  no  sooner  do  the  afternoon  shadows 
grow  to  any  length  than  the  air  freshens 
into  sharpness,  and  by  sundown  one  is 
glad  of  a  good  warm  shawl. 

OCTOBER  18. 

Another  bright,  ideal  day,  and  the 
morning  passed  in  a  delicious  flower- 
filled  room  looking  over  old  books  and 
records  and  listening  to  odd,  quaint  little 
scraps  from  the  old  Dutch  records.  But 
directly  after  luncheon  (and  how  hungry 
we  all  are,  and  how  delicious  everything 
tastes  on  shore !)  the  open  break  with 
four  capital  horses  comes  to  the  door, 
and  we  start  for  a  long,  lovely  drive. 
Half  a  mile  or  so  takes  us  out  on  a  flat 
red  road  with  Table  Mountain  rising 
straight  up  before  it,  but  on  the  left 
stretches  away  a  most  enchanting  pano- 
rama. It  is  all  so  soft  in  coloring  and 
tone,  distinct  and  yet  not  hard,  and  ex- 
quisitely beautiful ! 


The  Blue-Berg  range  of  mountains 
stretch  beyond  the  great  bay,  which,  un- 
less a  "sou'-easter"  is  tearing  over  it, 
lies  glowing  in  tranquil  richness.  This 
afternoon  it  is  colored  like  an  Italian 
lake.  Here  are  lines  of  chrysoprase, 
green  -  fringed,  white  with  little  waves, 
and  beyond  lie  dark,  translucent,  purple 
depths,  which  change  with  every  passing 
cloud.  Beyond  these  amethystic  shoals 
again  stretches  the  deep  blue  water,  and 
again  beyond,  and  bluer  still,  rise  the  five 
ranges  of  "Hottentots'  Holland,"  which 
encircle  and  complete  the  landscape, 
bringing  the  eye  round  again  to  the 
nearer  cliffs  of  the  Devil's  Peak.  When 
the  Dutch  came  here  some  two  hundred 
years  ago,  they  seized  upon  this  part  of 
the  coast  and  called  it  Holland,  driving 
the  Hottentots  beyond  the  neighboring 
range  and  telling  them  that  was  to  be 
their  Holland — a  name  it  keeps  to  this 
day.  Their  consciences  must  have  trou- 
bled them  after  this  arbitrary  division  of 
the  soil,  for  up  the  highest  accessible 
spurs  of  their  own  mountain  they  took  the 
trouble  to  build  several  queer  little  square 
houses  called  "  block-houses,"  from  which 
they  could  keep  a  sharp  look-out  for  foes 
coming  over  the  hills  from  Hottentots' 
Holland.  The  foes  never  came,  how- 
ever, and  the  roofs  and  walls  of  the 
block -houses  have  gradually  tumbled 
in,  and  the  gun-carriages — for  they  man- 
aged to  drag  heavy  ordnance  up  the  steep 
hillside  —  have  rotted  away,  whilst  the 
old-fashioned  cannon  lie,  grim  and  rusty, 
amid  a  tangled  profusion  of  wild  geran- 
ium, heath  and  lilies.  I  scrambled  up 
to  one  of  the  nearest  block-houses,  and 
found  the  date  on  the  dismounted  gun  to 
be  more  than  a  hundred  years  old.  The 
view  was  beautiful  and  the  air  fresh  and 
fragrant  with  scent  of  flowers. 

But  to  return  to  our  drive.  I  could 
gaze  and  gaze  for  ever  at  this  lovely 
panorama,  but  am  told  this  is  the  ugliest 
part  of  the  road.  The  road  itself  is  cer- 
tainly not  pretty  just  here,  and  is  cloudy 
with  a  fine  red  dust,  but  this  view  of  sea 
and  distant  hills  is  enchanting.  Soon 
we  get  under  the  lee  of  the  great  moun- 
tain, and  then  its  sheltering  arms  show 
their  protective  power ;  for  splendid  oak 


8 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


avenues  begin  to  border  the  road  all  the 
way,  and  miniature  forests  of  straight- 
stemmed  pines  and  shimmering  belts  of 
the  ghostly  silver  tree  run  up  all  the 
mountain-clefts.  Stem  and  leaf  of  the 
silver  tree  are  all  of  purest  white ;  and 
when  one  gets  a  gleam  of  sunlight  on  a 
distant  patch  of  these  trees,  the  effect  is 
quite  indescribable,  contrasting,  as  they 
do,  with  green  of  field  and  vineyard. 
The  vines  all  about  here  and  towards 
Constantia,  thirteen  miles  off,  are  dwarf- 
plants,  and  only  grow  to  the  height  of 
gooseberry-bushes.  It  is  a  particular 
species,  which  is  found  to  answer  best  as 
requiring  less  labor  to  train  and  cultivate, 
and  is  less  likely  to  be  blown  out  of  the 
ground  by  the  violent  "  sou'-easters " 
which  come  sweeping  over  the  mountain. 
These  gales  are  evidently  the  greatest 
annoyance  which  Cape  Colonists  have  to 
endure ;  and  although  everybody  kindly 
suggests  that  I  ought  to  see  one,  just  to 
understand  what  it  is  like,  I  am  profound- 
ly thankful  that  I  only  know  it  from  their 
description  and  my  own  distinct  recol- 
lection of  the  New  Zealand  "  nor'-west- 
ers."  Those  were  hot  winds,  scorching 
and  curling  up  everything,  whereas  this 
is  rather  a  cold  breeze,  although  it  blows 
chiefly  in  summer.  It  whirls  along  clouds 
of  dust  from  the  red  clay  roads  and  fields 
which  penetrates  and  clings  to  everything 
in  the  most  extraordinary  manner.  All 
along  the  road  the  stems  and  lower 
branches  of  the  trees  are  dyed  a  deep 
brick-dust  color,  and  I  hear  moving  and 
pathetic  stories  of  how  it  ruins  clothes, 
not  only  utterly  spoiling  black  silk  dresses, 
but  staining  white  petticoats  and  chil- 
dren's frocks  and  pinafores  with  a  bor- 
der of  color  exactly  like  the  ruddle  with 
which  sheep  are  branded.  Especially  is 
it  the  terror  of  sailors,  rendering  the  nav- 
igation along  the  coast  dangerous  and 
difficult;  for  it  blends  land  and  water 
into  one  indistinct  whirl  of  vaporous 
cloud,  confusing  and  blurring  everything 
until  one  cannot  distinguish  shore  from 
sea. 

The  vineyards  of  Constantia  origin- 
ally took  their  pretty  name  from  the  fair 
daughter  of  one  of  the  early  Dutch  gov- 
ernors, but  now  it  has  grown  into  a  generic 


word,  and  you  see  "Cloete's  Constantia," 
"  Von  Reybeck  Constantia,"  written  upon 
great  stone  gateways  leading  by  long 
avenues  into  the  various  vine-growing 
plantations.  It  was  to  the  former  of 
these  constantias,  which  was  also  the 
farthest  off,  that  we  were  bound  that 
pleasant  summer  afternoon,  and  from 
the  time  we  got  out  of  the  carriage  until 
the  moment  we  re-entered  it — all  too 
soon,  but  it  is  a  long  drive  back  in  the 
short  cold  twilight — I  felt  as  though  I 
had  stepped  through  a  magic  portal  into 
the  scene  of  one  of  Washington  Irving's 
stories.  It  was  all  so  simple  and  home- 
ly, so  quaint  and  so  inexpressibly  pic- 
turesque. The  house  had  stood  there 
for  a  couple  of  hundred  years,  and  looks 
as  though  it  might  last  for  ever,  with  its 
air  of  cool,  leisurely  repose  and  comfort 
and  strength. 

In  the  flagged  hall  stands  a  huge  stal- 
actite some  ten  feet  high,  brought  a  hun- 
dred years  ago  from  caves  far  away  in 
the  distant  ranges.  It  is  shaped  some- 
thing like  a  Malay's  hat,  only  the  peak 
tapers  to  a  point  about  eight  feet  high. 
The  drawing-room — though  it  seems  a 
profanation  to  call  that  venerable  stately 
room  by  so  flippant  and  modern  a  name 
— is  large,  ceiled  with  great  beams  of 
cedar,  and  lighted  by  lofty  windows, 
which  must  contain  many  scores  of  small 
panes  of  glass.  There  were  treasures  of 
rarest  old  china  and  delfware,  and  curi- 
ous old  carved  stands  for  fragile  dishes. 
A  wealth  of  swinging-baskets  of  flowers 
and  ferns  and  bright  girl  -  faces  lighted 
up  the  solemn,  shady  old  room,  in  which 
we  must  not  linger,  for  there  is  much  to 
see  outside.  First  to  the  cellar,  as  it  is 
called,  though  it  is  far  from  being  under 
ground,  and  is,  in  fact,  a  spacious  stone 
building  with  an  elaborately-carved  ped- 
iment. Here  are  rows  and  rows  of  giant 
casks,  stretching  on  either  hand  into  av- 
enues in  the  black  distance,  but  these  are 
mere  children  in  the  nursery,  compared 
to  those  we  are  going  to  see.  First  we 
must  pause  in  a  middle  room  full  of 
quaintest  odds  and  ends  —  crossbows, 
long  whips  of  hippopotamus  hide,  strange 
rusty  old  swords  and  firearms — to  look 
at  a  map  of  South  Africa  drawn  some- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


where  about  1640.  It  hangs  on  the  wall 
and  is  hardly  to  be  touched,  for  the  paint 
and  varnish  crack  and  peel  off  at  a 
breath.  It  is  a  marvel  of  accurate  geo- 
graphical knowledge,  and  is  far  better 
filled  in  than  the  maps  of  yesterday. 
All  poor  Livingstone's  great  geograph- 
ical discoveries  are  marked  on  it  as  being 
— perhaps  only  from  description — known 
or  guessed  at  all  that  long  time  ago.  It 
was  found  impossible  to  photograph  it 
on  account  of  the  dark  shade  which  age 
has  laid  over  the  original  yellow  varnish, 
but  a  careful  tracing  has  been  made  and, 
I  believe,  sent  home  to  the  Geographical 
Society.  It  is  in  the  long  corridor  be- 
yond this  that  the  "stuck-vats"  live — 
puncheons  which  hold  easily  some  thou- 
sand gallons  or  so,  and  are  of  a  solemn 
rotundity  calculated  to  strike  awe  into 
the  beholder's  heart.  Here  is  white  con- 
stantia,  red  constantia,  young  constantia, 
middle-aged  constantia,  and  constantia 
so  old  as  to  be  a  liqueur  almost  beyond 
price.  When  it  has  been  kept  all  these 
years,  the  sweetness  by  which  it  is  dis- 
tinguished becomes  so  absorbed  and 
blended  as  to  be  hardly  perceptible. 

Presently  one  of  the  party  throws  a  door 
suddenly  open,  and,  behold,  we  are  stand- 
ing right  over  a  wild  wooded  glen  with  a 
streamlet  running  through  it,  and  black 
washerwomen  beating  heaps  of  white 
clothes  on  the  strips  of  shingle.  Turtle- 
doves are  cooing,  and  one  might  almost 
fancy  one  was  back  again  on  the  wild 
Scotch  west  coast,  until  some  one  else 
says  calmly,  "Look  at  the  ostriches!" 
Here  they  come,  with  a  sort  of  dancing 
step,  twisting  their  long  necks  and  snake- 
like  heads  from  side  to  side  in  search  of 
a  tempting  pebble  or  trifle  of  hardware. 
Their  wings  are  slightly  raised,  and  the 
long  fringe  of  white  feathers  rustles  soft- 
ly as  they  trot  easily  and  gracefully  past 
us.  They  are. young  male  birds,  and  in 
a  few  months  more  their  plumage,  which 
now  resembles  that  of  a  turkey-cock,  will 
be  jet  black,  except  the  wing-feathers.  A 
few  drops  of  rain  are  falling,  so  we  hur- 
ry back  to  where  the  carriage  is  standing 
under  some  splendid  oak  trees,  swallow 
a  sort  of  stirrup-cup  of  delicious  hot  tea, 
and  so  home  again  as  fast  as  we  can  go. 


OCTOBER  19. 

It  is  decided  that  I  must  take  a  drive 
in  a  Cape  cart ;  so  directly  after  break- 
fast a  smart  workman-like-looking  ve- 
hicle, drawn  by  a  pair  of  well-bred  iron- 
gray  cobs,  dashes  up  under  the  portico. 
There  are  capital  horses  here,  but  they 
fetch  a  good  price,  and  such  a  pair  as 
these  would  easily  find  purchasers  at 
one  hundred  and  fifty  pounds.  The 
cart  itself  is  very  trim  and  smart,  with 
a  framework  sort  of  head,  which  falls 
back  at  pleasure,  and  it  holds  four  peo- 
ple easily.  It  is  a  capital  vehicle,  light 
and  strong  and  uncommonly  comfort- 
able, but  I  am  warned  not  to  imagine 
that  all  Cape  carts  are  as  easy  as  this 
one.  Away  we  go  at  a  fine  pace  through 
the  delicious  sparkling  morning  sunshine 
and  crisp  air,  soon  turning  off  the  red 
high-road  into  a  sandy,  marshy  flat  with 
a  sort  of  brackish  back-water  standing 
in  pools  here  and  there.  We  are  going 
to  call  on  Langalibalele,  and  his  son, 
Malambuli,  who  are  located  at  Uitvlugt 
on  the  Cape  downs,  about  four  miles 
from  the  town.  It  is  a  sort  of  farm-resi- 
dence ;  and  considering  that  the  chief 
has  hitherto  lived  in  a  reed  hut,  he  is  not 
badly  off,  for  he  has  plenty  of  room  out 
of  doors  as  well  as  a  good  house  over 
his  head.  We  bump  over  some  strange 
and  rough  bits  of  sandy  road  and  climb 
up  and  down  steep  banks  in  a  manner 
seldom  done  on  wheels.  There  is  a  wealth 
of  lovely  flowers  blooming  around,  but 
I  can't  help  fixing  my  eyes  on  the  pole 
of  the  cart,  which  is  sometimes  sticking 
straight  up  in  the  air,  its  silver  hook 
shining  merrily  in  the  sun,  or  else  it  has 
disappeared  altogether,  and  I  can  only 
see  the  horses'  haunches.  That  is  when 
we  are  going  down  hill,  and  I  think  it  is 
a  more  terrible  sensation  than  when  we 
are  playfully  scrambling  up  some  sandy 
hillock  as  a  cat  might. 

Here  is  the  location  at  last,  thank 
Heaven  !  and  there  is  Langalibalele  sit- 
ting in  the  verandah  stoep  (pronounced 
"stoup")  on  his  haunches  on  a  brick. 
He  looks  as  comfortable  as  if  he  were 
in  an  arm-chair,  but  it  must  be  a  dif- 
ficult thing  to  do  if  you  think  seriously 
of  it.  The  etiquette  seems  to  be  to  take 


10 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


no  notice  of  him  as  we  pass  into  the  par- 
lor, where  we  present  our  pass  and  the 
people  in  authority  satisfy  themselves 
that  we  are  quite  in  rule.  Then  the 
old  chief  walks  quietly  in,  takes  off  his 
soft  felt  hat  and  sits  himself  down  in  a 
Windsor  arm-chair  with  grave  delibera- 
tion. He  is  uncommonly  ugly ;  but 
when  one  remembers  that  he  is  nearly 
seventy  years  of  age,  it  is  astonishing  to 
see  how  young  he  looks.  Langalibalele 
is  not  a  true  Kafir  at  all :  he  is  a  Fingor, 
a  half-caste  tribe  contemptuously  chris- 
tened by  the  Kafirs  "dogs."  His  wool 
grows  in  distinct  and  separate  clumps 
like  hassocks  of  grass  all  over  his  head. 
He  is  a  large  and  powerful  man  and 
looks  the  picture  of  sleek  contentment, 
as  well  he  may.  Only  one  of  his  sons, 
a  good-natured,  fine  young  man,  black 
as  ebony,  is  with  him,  and  the  chief's 
one  expressed  grievance  is  that  none  of 
his  wives  will  come  to  him.  In  vain  he 
sends  commands  and  entreaties  to  these 
dusky  ladies  to  come  and  share  his  sol- 
itude. They  return  for  answer  that  "they 
are  working  for  somebody  else;"  for, 
alas !  the  only  reason  their  presence  is 
desired  is  that  they  may  cultivate  some 
of  the  large  extent  of  ground  placed  at 
the  old  chief's  disposal.  Neither  he  nor 
his  stalwart  'son  would  dream  for  a  mo- 
ment of  touching  spade  or  hoe ;  but  if 
the  ladies  of  the  family  could  only  be 
made  to  see  their  duty,  an  honest  penny 
might  easily  be  turned  by  oats  or  rye.  I 
gave  him  a  large  packet  of  sugar-plums, 
which  he  seized  with  childish  delight  and 
hid  away  exactly  like  the  big  monkeys 
at  the  Zoo. 

By  way  of  a  joke,  Malambuli  pretended 
to  want  to  take  them  away,  and  the  chat- 
tering and  laughing  which  followed  was 
almost  deafening.  But  by  and  by  a  gen- 
tleman of  the  party  presented  a  big  parcel 
of  the  best  tobacco,  and  the  chuckling  old 
chief  made  over  at  once  all  my  sweet- 
meats "jintly"  to  his  son,  and  proceeded 
to  hide  away  his  new  treasure.  He  was 


dressed  exactly  like  a  dissenting  minis- 
ter, and  declared  through  the  interpreter 
he  was  perfectly  comfortable.  The  im- 
pression here  seems  to  be  that  he  is  a 
restless,  intriguing  and  mischief-making 
old  man,  who  may  consider  himself  as 
having  come  out  of  the  hornets'  nest  he 
tried  to  stir  up  uncommonly  well. 

We  don't  want  to  bump  up  and  down 
the  sandy  plain  again,  so  a  lively  con- 
versation goes  on  in  Dutch  about  the 
road  between  one  of  my  gentlemen  and 
somebody  who  looks  like  a"stuck-vat" 
upon  short  legs.  The  dialogue  is  fluent 
and  lively,  beginning  with  "  Ja,  ja  !"  and 
ending  with  "All  right!"  but  it  leads  to 
our  hitting  off  the  right  track  exactly, 
and  coming  out  at  a  lovely  little  cottage- 
villa  under  the  mountain,  where  we  rest 
and  lunch  and  then  stroll  about  up  the 
hill  spurs,  through  myrtle  hedges  and 
shady  oak  avenues.  Then,  before  the 
afternoon  shadows  grow  too  long,  we 
drive  off  to  "Groote  Schuur,"  the  an- 
cient granary  of  the  first  settlers,  which 
is  now  turned  into  a  roomy,  comfortable 
country-house,  perfect  as  a  summer  res- 
idence, and  securely  sheltered  from  the 
"  sou '-casters."  We  approach  it  through 
a  double  avenue  of  tall  Italian  pines,  and 
after  a  little  while  go  out  once  more  for 
a  ramble  up  some  quaint  old  brick  steps, 
and  so  through  a  beautiful  glen  alPfringed 
and  feathered  with  fresh  young  fronds 
of  maiden-hair  ferns,  and  masses  of  hy- 
drangea bushes,  which  must  be  beautiful 
as  a  poet's  dream  when  they  are  covered 
with  their  great  bunches  of  pale  blue 
blossom.  That  will  not  be  until  Christ- 
mas-tide, and,  alas !  I  shall  not  be  here 
to  see,  for  already  my  three  halcyon 
days  of  grace  are  ended  and  over,  and 
this  very  evening  we  must  steam  away 
from  a  great  deal  yet  unvisited  of  what 
is  interesting  and  picturesque,  and  from 
friends  who  three  days  ago  were  stran- 
gers, but  who  have  made  eveiy  moment 
since  we  landed  stand  out  as  a  bright  and 
pleasant  landmark  on  life's  highway. 


:F.A.:R,T 


ALCOA  BAY,  October  23,  1875. 

TWO  days  ago  we  steamed  out  of 
Table  Bay  on  just  such  a  gray,  driz- 
zling afternoon  as  that  on  which  we  en- 
tered it.  But  the  weather  cleared  direct- 
ly we  got  out  to  sea,  and  since  then  it 
has  carried  us  along  as  though  we  had 
been  on  a  pleasant  summer  cruise.  All 
yesterday  we  were  coasting  along  the 
low  downs  which  edge  the  dangerous 
sea-board  for  miles  upon  miles.  From 
the  deck  of  the  Edinburgh  Castle  the 
effect  is  monotonous  enough,  although 
just  now  everything  is  brightly  green ; 
and,  with  their  long  ribbon  fringe  of 
white  breaker-foam  glinting  in  the  spring 
sunshine,  the  stretches  of  undulating  hil- 
locks looked  their  best.  This  part  of  the 
coast  is  well  lighted,  and  it  was  always 
a  matter  of  felicitation  at  night  when, 
every  eighty  miles  or  so,  the  guiding 
rays  of  a  lighthouse  shone  out  in  the 
soft  gloom  of  the  starlight  night.  One 
of  these  lonely  towers  stands  more  than 
eight  hundred  feet  above  the  sea-level, 
and  warns  ships  off  the  terrible  Agulhas 
Bank. 

We  have  dropped  our  anchor  this 
fresh  bright  morning  a  mile  or  so  from 
the  shore  on  which  Port  Elizabeth  stands. 
Algoa  Bay  is  not  much  of  a  shelter,  and 
it  is  always  a  chance  whether  a  sudden 
south-easter  may  not  come  tearing  down 
upon  the  shipping,  necessitating  a  sud- 
den tripping  of  anchors  and  running  out 
to  sea  to  avoid  the  fate  which  is  staring 
us  warningly  in  the  face  in  the  shape  of 
the  gaunt  ribs  or  rusty  cylinders  of  sun- 
dry cast-away  vessels.  To-day  the  weath- 
er is  on  its  good  behavior ;  the  south- 
easter rests  on  its 

aery  nest 
As  still  as  a  brooding  dove  ; 

and  sun  and  sea  are  doing  their  best  to 
show  off  the  queer  little  straggling  town 
creeping  up  the  low  sandy  hills  that  lie 
before  us.  I  am  assured  that  Port  Eliz- 
abeth is  a  flourishing  mercantile  place. 


From  the  deck  of  our  ship  I  can't  at  all 
perceive  that  it  is  flourishing,  or  doing 
anything  except  basking  in  the  pleasant 
sunshine.  But  when  I  go  on  shore  an 
hour  or  two  later  I  am  shown  a  store 
which  takes  away  my  breath,  and  before 
whose  miscellaneous  contents  the  stout- 
est-hearted female  shopper  must  needs 
baisser  son  pavilion.  Everything  in  this 
vast  emporium  looked  as  neat  and  or- 
derly as  possible,  and,  though  the  build- 
ing was  twice  as  big  as  the  largest 
co-operative  store  in  London,  there  was 
no  hurry  or  confusion.  Thimbles  and 
ploughs,  eau-de-cologne  and  mangles, 
American  stoves,  cotton  dresses  of  as- 
tounding patterns  to  suit  the  taste  of 
Dutch  ladies,  harmoniums  and  flat-irons, 
— all  stood  peaceably  side  by  side  to- 
gether. But  these  were  all  "  unconsid- 
ered  trifles  "  next  the  more  serious  busi- 
ness of  the  establishment,  which  was 
wool — wool  in  every  shape  and  stage 
and  bale.  In  this  department,  however, 
although  for  the  sake  of  the  dear  old 
New  Zealand  days  my  heart  warms  at 
the  sight  of  the  huge  packages,  I  was 
not  supposed  to  take  any  interest;  so 
we  pass  quickly  out  into  the  street  again, 
get  into  a  large  open  carriage  driven  by 
a  black  coachman,  and  make  the  best 
of  our  way  up  to  a  villa  on  the  slope  of 
the  sandy  hill.  Once  I  am  away  from 
the  majestic  influence  of  that  store  the 
original  feeling  of  Port  Elizabeth  being 
rather  a  dreary  place  comes  back  upon 
me ;  but  we  drive  all  about — to  the  Park, 
which  may  be  said  to  be  in  its  swaddling- 
clothes  as  a  park,  and  to  the  Botanic 
Gardens,  where  the  culture  of  foreign 
and  colonial  flowers  and  shrubs  is  car- 
ried on  under  the  chronic  difficulties  of. 
too  much  sun  and  wind  and  too  little 
water.  Everywhere  there  is  building 
going  on  —  very  modest  building,  it  is 
true,  with  rough-and-ready  masonry  or 
timber,  and  roofs  of  zinc  painted  in  strips 
of  light  colors,  but  everywhere  there  are 
ii 


12 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


signs  of  progress  and  growth.  People 
look  bored,  but  healthy,  and  it  does  not 
surprise  me  in  the  least  to  hear  that 
though  there  are  a  good  many  inhabit- 
ants, there  is  not  much  society.  A  pret- 
ty little  luncheon  and  a  pleasant  hour's 
chat  in  a  cool,  shady  drawing-room,  with 
plenty  of  new  books  and  music  and  flow- 
ers, gave  me  an  agreeable  impression  to 
carry  back  on  board  the  ship ;  which, 
by  the  way,  seemed  strangely  silent  and 
deserted  when  we  returned,  for  most  of 
our  fellow-passengers  had  disembarked 
here  on  their  way  to  different  parts  of 
the  interior. 

As  I  saunter  up  and  down  the  clean, 
smart-looking  deck  of  what  has  been 
our  pleasant  floating  home  during  these 
past  four  weeks,  I  suddenly  perceive  a 
short,  squat  pyramid  on  the  shore, 
standing  out  oddly  enough  among  the 
low-roofed  houses.  If  it  had  only  been 
red  instead  of  gray,  it  might  have  pass- 
ed for  the  model  of  the  label  on  Bass's 
beer -bottles;  but,  even  as  it  is,  I  feel 
convinced  that  there  is  a  story  connected 
with  it :  and  so  it  proves,  for  this  ugly, 
most  unsentimental-looking  bit  of  ma- 
sonry was  built  long  ago  by  a  former 
governor  as  a  record  of  the  virtues  and 
perfections  of  his  dead  wife,  whom, 
among  other  lavish  epithets  of  praise, 
he  declares  to  have  been  "  the  most  per- 
fect of  women."  Anyhow,  there  it  stands, 
on  what  was  once  a  lonely  strip  of  sand 
and  sea,  a  memorial — if  one  can  only 
believe  the  stone  story,  now  nearly  a 
hundred  years  old — of  a  great  love  and 
a  great  sorrow ;  and  one  can  envy  the 
one  and  pity  the  other  just  as  much 
when  looking  at  this  queer,  unsightly 
monument  as  when  one  stands  on  the 
pure  marble  threshold  of  the  exquisite 
Taj  Mahal  at  Agra,  and  reads  that  it  too, 
in  all  its  grace  and  beauty,  was  reared 
"in  memory  of  an  undying  love." 

Although  the  day  has  been  warm  and 
balmy,  the  evening  arr  strikes  chill  and 
raw,  and  our  last  evening  on  board  the 
dear  old  ship  has  to  be  spent  under 
shelter,  for  it  is  too  cold  to  sit  on  deck. 
With  the  first  hours  of  daylight  next 
morning  we  have  to  be  up  and  packing, 
for  by  ten  o'clock  we  must  be  on  board 


the  Florence,  a  small,  yacht-like  coast- 
ing-steamer which  can  go  much  closer 
into  the  sand-blocked  harbors  scooped  by 
the  action  of  the  rivers  all  along  the  coast. 
It  is  with  a  very  heavy  heart  that  I,  for 
one,  say  good-bye  to  the  Edinburgh  Cas- 
tle, where  I  have  passed  so  many  hap- 
py hours  and  made  some  pleasant  ac- 
quaintances. A  ship  is  a  very  forcing- 
house  of  friendship,  and  no  one  who  has 
not  taken  a  voyage  can  realize  how  rap- 
idly an  acquaintance  grows  and  ripens 
into  a  friend  under  the  lonely  influences 
of  sea  and  sky.  We  have  all  been  so 
happy  together,  everything  has  been  so 
comfortable,  everybody  so  kind,  that  one 
would  indeed  be  cold-hearted  if,  when 
the  last  moment  of  our  halcyon  voyage 
arrived,  it  could  bring  with  it  anything 
short  of  a  regret. 

With  the  same  chivalrous  goodness 
and  courtesy  which  has  taken  thought 
for  the  comfort  of  our  every  movement 
since  we  left  Dartmouth,  our  captain  in- 
sists on  seeing  us  safely  on  board  the 
Florence  (what  a  toy -boat  she  looks  af- 
ter our  stately  ship !)  and  satisfying  him- 
self that  we  can  be  comfortably  settled 
once  more  in  our  doll's  house  of  a  new 
cabin.  Then  there  comes  a  reluctant 
"Good-bye"  to  him  and  all  our  kind 
care-takers  of  the  Edinburgh  Castle ; 
and  the  last  glimpse  we  catch  of  her — 
for  the  Florence  darts  out  of  the  bay  like 
a  swallow  in  a  hurry — is  her  dipping  her 
ensign  in  courteous  farewell  to  us. 

In  less  than  twenty-four  hours  we  had 
reached  another  little  port,  some  hun- 
dred and  fifty  miles  or  so  up  the  coast, 
called  East  London.  Here  the  harbor 
is  again  only  an  open  roadstead,  and 
hardly  any  vessel  drawing  more  than 
three  or  four  feet  of  water  can  get  in  at 
all  near  the  shore,  for  between  us  and  it 
is  a  bar  of  shifting  sand,  washed  down, 
day  by  day,  by  the  strong  current  of  the 
river  Buffalo.  All  the  cargo  has  to  be 
transferred  to  lighters,  and  a  little  tug 
steamer  bustles  backward  and  forward 
with  messages  of  entreaty  to  those  said 
lighters  to  come  out  and  take  away  their 
loads.  Wre  had  dropped  our  anchor  by 
daylight,  yet  at  ten  o'clock  scarcely  a 
boat  had  made  its  appearance  alongside, 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


and  every  one  was  fuming  and  fretting 
at  the  delay  and  consequent  waste  of 
fine  weather  and  daylight.  That  is  to 
say,  it  was  a  fine  bright  day  overhead, 
with  sunshine  and  sparkle  all  round,  but 
the  heavy  roll  of  the  sea  never  ceased 
for  a  moment.  From  one  side  to  the 
other,  until  her  ports  touched  the  water, 
backward  and  forward,  with  slow,  monot- 
onous heaving,  our  little  vessel  swayed 
with  the  swaying  rollers  until  everybody 
on  board  felt  sick  and  sorry.  "  This  is 
comparatively  a  calm  day,"  I  was  told: 
"you  can't  possible  imagine  from  this 
what  rolling  really  is."  But  I  can  imag- 
ine quite  easily,  and  do  not  at  all  desire 
a  closer  acquaintance  with  this  restless 
Indian  Ocean.  Breakfast  is  a  moment  of 
penance :  little  G is  absolutely  faint- 
ing from  agonies  of  sea-sickness,  though 
he  has  borne 'all  our  South-Atlantic  toss- 
ings  with  perfect  equanimity ;  and  it  is 
with  real  joy  that  I  hear  the  lifeboat  is 
alongside,  and  that  the  kind-hearted  cap- 
tain of  the  Florence  (how  kind  sailors 
are  !)  offers  to  take  babies,  nurse  and  me 
on  shore,  so  as  to  escape  a  long  day  of 
this  agonizing  rolling.  In  happy  un- 
consciousness of  what  landing  at  East 
London,  even  in  a  lifeboat,  meant  when 
a  bar  had  to  be  crossed,  we  were  all  tum- 
bled and  bundled,  more  or  less  uncere- 
moniously, into  the  great,  roomy  boat, 
and  were  immediately  taken  in  hand  by 
the  busy  little  tug.  For  half  a  mile  or 
more  we  made  good  progress  in  her 
wake,  being  in  a  position  to  set  at  naught 
the  threatening  water-mountains  which 
came  tumbling  in  furious  haste  from  sea- 
ward. It  was  not  until  we  seemed  close 
to  the  shore  and  all  our  troubles  over 
that  the  tug  was  obliged  to  cast  us  off, 
owing  to  the  rapidly  shoaling  water,  and 
we  prepared  to  make  the  best  of  our 
own  way  in.  Bad  was  that  best,  indeed, 
though  the  peril  came  and  went  so  quick- 
ly that  it  is  but  a  confused  impression  I 
retain  of  what  seemed  to  me  a  really  ter- 
rible moment.  One  instant  I  hear  fe- 
licitations exchanged  between  our  cap- 
tain— who  sits  protectingly  close  to  me 

and  poor,  fainting  little  G ,  who  lies 

like  death  in  my  arms — and  the  captain 
of  the  lifeboat.  The  next  moment,  in 


spite  of  sudden  panic  and  presence  of 
danger,  I  could  laugh  to  hear  the  latter 
sing  out  in  sharpest  tones  of  terror  and 
dismay,  "Ah,  you  would,  would  you?" 
coupled  with  rapid  orders  to  the  stout 
rowers  and  shouts  to  us  of  "Look  out!" 
and  I  do  look  out,  to  see  on  one  side  sand 
which  the  retreating  wave  has  sucked 
dry,  and  in  which  the  boat  seems  trying 
to  bury  herself  as  though  she  were  a 
mole:  on  the  other  hand  there  towers 
above  us  a  huge  green  wave,  white- 
crested  and  curled,  which  is  rushing  at 
us  like  a  devouring  monster.  I  glance, 
as  I  think,  for  the  last  time,  at  the  pale 
nurse,  on  whose  lap  lies  the  baby  placid- 
ly sucking  his  bottle.  I  see  a  couple  of 
sailors  lay  hold  of  her  and  the  child  with 
one  hand  each,  whilst  with  the  other  they 
cling  desperately  to  the  thwarts.  A  stout 
seafaring  man  flings  the  whole  weight 
of  his  ponderous  pilot-coated  body  upon 

G and  me :  I  hear  a  roar  of  water, 

and,  lo !  we  are  washed  right  up  along- 
side of  the  rude  landing-place,  still  in 
the  boat  indeed,  but  wet  and  frightened 
to  the  last  degree.  Looking  back  on  it 
all,  I  can  distinctly  remember  that  it  was 
not  the  sight  of  the  overhanging  wave 
which  cost  me  my  deadliest  pang  of  sick- 
ening fright,  but  the  glimpse  I  caught  of 
the  shining,  cruel-looking  sand,  sucking 
us  in  so  silently  and  greedily.  We  were 
all  trembling  so  much  that  it  seemed  as 
impossible  to  stand  upright  on  the  earth 
as  on  the  tossing  waters,  and  it  was  with 
reeling,  drunken-looking  steps  that  we 
rolled  and  staggered  through  the  heavy 
sand-street  until  we  reached  the  shelter 
of  an  exceedingly  dirty  hotel.  Every- 
thing in  it  required  courage  to  touch,  and 
it  was  with  many  qualms  that  I  deposited 
limp  little  G on  a  filthy  sofa.  How- 
ever, the  mistress  of  the  house  looked 
clean,  and  so  did  the  cups  and  saucers 
she  quickly  produced ;  and  by  the  time 
we  had  finished  a  capital  breakfast  we 
were  all  quite  in  good  spirits  again,  and 
so  sharpened  up  as  to  be  able  to  "mock 
ourselves"  of  our  past  perils  and  present 
discomforts.  Outside  there  were  strange, 
beautiful  shrubs  in  flower,  tame  pigeons 
came  cooing  and  bowing  in  at  the  door, 
and  above  all  there  was  an  enchanting 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


freshness  and  balminess  in  the  sunny 
air. 

In  about  an  hour  "Capting  Florence" 

(as  G styles  our  new  commander) 

calls  for  us  and  takes  us  out  sight-seeing. 
First  and  foremost,  across  the  river  to  the 
rapidly-growing  railway  lines,  where  a 
brand-new  locomotive  was  hissing  away 
with  full  steam  up.  Here  we  were  met 
and  welcomed  by  the  energetic  superin- 
tendent of  this  iron  road,  and,  to  my  in- 
tense delight,  after  explaining  to  me  what 
a  long  distance  into  the  interior  the  line 
had  to  go  and  how  fast  it  was  getting  on, 
considering  the  difficulties  in  the  way 
of  doing  anything  in  South  Africa,  from 
washing  a  pocket-handkerchief  up  to  lay- 
ing down  a  railway,  he  proposed  that  we 
should  get  on  the  engine  and  go  as  far 
as  the  line  was  open  for  anything  like 
safe  traveling.  Never  were  such  de- 
lightful five  minutes  as  those  spent  in 
whizzing  along  through  the  park-like 
country  and  cutting  fast  through  the 
heavenly  air.  In  vain  did  I  smell  that 
my  serge  skirts  were  getting  dreadfully 
singed,  in  vain  did  I  see  most  uncertain 
bits  of  rail  before  me  :  it  was  all  too  per- 
fectly enchanting  to  care  for  danger  or 
disgrace,  and  I  could  have  found  it  in 

my  heart  to  echo  G 's  plaintive  cry 

for  "More!"  when  we  came  to  the  end 
and  had  to  get  off.  But  it  consoled  us  a 
little  to  watch  the  stone-breaking  ma- 
chine crunching  up  small  rocks  as  though 
they  had  been  lumps  of  sugar,  and  after 
looking  at  that  we  set  off  for  the  unfin- 
ished station,  and  could  take  in,  even  in 
its  present  skeleton  state,  how  commo- 
dious and  handsome  it  will  all  be  some 
day.  You  are  all  so  accustomed  to  be 
whisked  about  the  civilized  world  when 
and  where  you  choose  that  it  is  difficult 
to  make  you  understand  the  enormous 
boon  the  first  line  of  railway  is  to  a  new 
country — not  only  for  the  convenience 
of  travelers,  but  for  the  transport  of  goods, 
the  setting  free  of  hundreds  of  cattle  and 
horses  and  drivers — all  sorely  needed  for 
other  purposes  —  and  the  fast-following 
effects  of  opening  up  the  resources  of  the 
back  districts.  In  these  regions  labor  is 
the  great  difficulty,  and  one  needs  to  hold 
both  patience  and  temper  fast  with  both 


one's  hands  when  watching  either  Kafir 
or  Coolie  at  work.  The  white  man  can- 
not or  will  not  do  much  with  his  hands 
out  here,  so  the  navvies  are  slim-looking 
blacks,  who  jabber  and  grunt  and  sigh 
a  good  deal  more  than  they  work. 

It  is  a  fortunate  circumstance  that  the 
delicious  air  keeps  us  all  in  a  chronic  state 
of  hunger,  for  it  appears  in  South  Africa 
that  one  is  expected  to  eat  every  half 
hour  or  so.  And,  shamed  am  I  to  con- 
fess, we  do  eat — and  eat  with  a  good  ap- 
petite too  —  a  delicious  luncheon  at  the 
superintendent's,  albeit  it  followed  close- 
ly on  the  heels  of  our  enormous  break- 
fast at  the  dirty  hotel.  Such  a  pretty  lit- 
tle bachelor's  box  as  it  was  ! — so  cool  and 
quiet  and  neat!  —  built  somewhat  after 
the  fashion  of  the  Pompeian  houses,  with 
a  small  square  garden  full  of  orange 
trees  in  the  centre,  and  the  house  run- 
ning round  this  opening  in  four  corridors. 
After  lunch  a  couple  of  nice,  light  Cape 
carts  came  to  the  door,  and  we  set  off  to 
see  a  beautiful  garden  whose  owner  had 
all  a  true  Dutchman's  passion  for  flowers. 
Here  was  fruit  as  well  as  flowers.  .Pine- 
apples and  jasmine,  strawberries  and 
honeysuckle,  grew  side  by  side  with  bor- 
dering orange  trees,  feathery  bamboos 
and  sheltering  gum  trees.  In  the  midst 
of  the  garden  stood  a  sort  of  double  plat- 
form, up  whose  steep  border  we  all  climb- 
ed :  from  this  we  got  a  good  idea  of  the 
slightly  undulating  land  all  about,  waving 
down  like  solidified  billows  to  where  the 
deep  blue  waters  sparkled  and  rolled 
restlessly  beyond  the  white  line  of  waves 
ever  breaking  on  the  bar.  I  miss  ani- 
mal life  sadly  in  these  parts :  the  dogs  I 
see  about  the  streets  are  few  in  number, 
and  miserably  currish  specimens  of  their 
kind.  "Good  dogs  don't  answer  out 
here,"  I  am  told:  that  is  to  say,  they 
get  a  peculiar  sort  of  distemper,  or  ticks 
bite  them,  or  they  got  weak  from  loss 
of  blood,  or  become  degenerate  in  some 
way.  The  horses  and  cattle  are  small 
and  poor-looking,  and  hard-worked,  very 
dear  to  buy  and  very  difficult  to  keep  and 
to  feed.  I  don't  even  see  many  cats, 
and  a  pet  bird  is  a  rarity.  However,  as 
we  stood  on  the  breezy  platform  I  saw  a 
most  beautiful  wild  bird  fly  over  the  rose- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


hedge  just  below  us.  It  was  about  as  big 
as  a  crow,  but  with  a  strange  iridescent 
plumage.  When  it  flitted  into  the  sun- 
shine its  back  and  wings  shone  like  a 
rainbow,  and  the  next  moment  it  looked 
perfectly  black  and  velvety  in  the  shade. 
Now  a  turquoise-blue  tint  comes  out  on 
its  spreading  wings,  and  a  slant  in  the 
sunshine  turns  the  blue  into  a  chryso- 
prase  green.  Nobody  could  tell  me  its 
name :  our  Dutch  host  spoke  exactly 
like  Hans  Breitmann,  and  declared  it 
was  a  "bid  of  a  crow,"  and  so  we  had 
to  leave  it  and  the  platform  and  come 
down  to  more  roses  and  tea.  There 
was  so  much  yet  to  be  seen  and  to  be 
done  that  we  could  not  stay  long,  and, 
laden  with  magnificent  bouquets  of  gloire 
de  Dijon  roses  and  honeysuckle,  and 
divers  strange  and  lovely  flowers,  we 
drove  off  again  in  our  Cape  carts.  I  ob- 
served that  instead  of  saying  "Whoa!"  or 
checking  the  horses  in  any  way  by  the 
reins,  the  driver  always  whistles  to  them — 
a  long,  low  whistle — and  they  stand  quite 
still  directly.  We  bumped  up  and  down, 
over  extraordinarily  rough  places,  and 
finally  slid  down  a  steep  cutting  to  the 
brink  of  the  river  Buffalo,  over  which  we 
were  ferried,  all  standing,  on  a  big  punt, 
or  rather  pontoon.  A  hundred  yards  or 
so  of  rapid  driving  then  took  us  to  a  sort 
of  wharf  which  projected  into  the  river, 
where  the  important-looking  little  tug 
awaited  us ;  and  no  sooner  were  we  all 
safely  on  board — rather  a  large  party  by 
this  time,  for  we  had  gone  on  picking  up 
stragglers  ever  since  we  started,  only 
three  in  number,  from  the  hotel — than 
she  sputtered  and  fizzed  herself  off  up- 
stream. By  this  time  it  was  the  after- 
noon, and  I  almost  despair  of  making 
you  see  the  woodland  beauty  of  that 
broad  mere,  fringed  down  to  the  water's 
edge  ori  one  side  with  shrubs  and  tangle 
of  roses  and  woodbine,  with  ferns  and 
every  lovely  green  creeping  thing.  That 
was  on  the  bank  which  was  sheltered 
from  the  high  winds :  the  other  hillside 
showed  the  contrast,  for  there,  though 
green  indeed,  only  a  few  feathery  tufts  of 
pliant  shrubs  had  survived  the  force  of 
some  of  these  south-eastern  gales.  We 
paddled  steadily  along  in  mid-stream, 


and  from  the  bridge  (where  little  G 

and  I  had  begged  " Capting  Florence" 
to  let  us  stand)  one  could  see  the  double 
of  each  leaf  and  tendril  and  passing 
cloud  mirrored  sharp  and  clear  in  the 
crystalline  water.  The  lengthening  shad- 
ows from  rock  and  fallen  crag  were  in 
some  places  flung  quite  across  our  little 
boat,  and  so  through  the  soft,  lovely  air, 
flooded  with  brightest  sunshine,  we  made 
our  way,  up  past  Picnic  Creek,  where 
another  stream  joins  the  Buffalo,  and 
makes  miniature  green  islands  and  har- 
bors at  its  mouth,  up  as  far  as  the  river 
was  navigable  for  even  so  small  a  steamer 
as  ours.  Every  one  was  sorry  when  it 
became  time  to  turn,  but  there  was  no 
choice:  the  sun-burned,  good-looking 
captain  of  the  tug  held  up  a  warning 
hand,  and  round  we  went  with  a  wide 
sweep,  under  the  shadows,  out  into  the 
sunlight,  down  the  middle  of  the  stream, 
all  too  soon  to  please  us. 

Before  we  left  East  London,  however, 
there  was  one  more  great  work  to  be 
glanced  at,  and  accordingly  we  paid  a 
hasty  visit  to  the  office  of  the  superin- 
tendent of  the  new  harbor-works,  and 
saw  plans  and  drawings  of  what  will  in- 
deed be  a  magnificent  achievement  when 
carried  out.  Yard  by  yard,  with  patient 
under-sea  sweeping,  all  that  waste  of 
sand  brought  down  by  the  Buffalo  is 
being  cleared  away ;  yard  by  yard,  two 
massive  arms  of  solidest  masonry  are 
stretching  themselves  out  beyond  those 
cruel  breakers  :  the  river  is  being  forced 
into  so  narrow  a  channel  that  the  rush 
of  the  water  must  needs  carry  the  sand 
far  out  to  sea  in  future,  and  scatter  it  in 
soundings  where  it  cannot  accumulate 
into  such  a  barrier  as  that  which  now  ex- 
ists. Lighthouses  will  guard  this  safe  en- 
trance into  a  tranquil  anchorage,  and  so, 
at  some  not  too  far  distant  day,  there  is 
good  hope  that  East  London  may  be 
one  of  the  most  valuable  harbors  on 
this  vast  coast ;  and  when  her  railway 
has  reached  even  the  point  to  which  it  is 
at  present  projected,  nearly  two  hundred 
miles  away,  it  will  indeed  be  a  thriving 
place.  Even  now,  there  is  a  greater  air 
of  movement  and  life  and  progress  about 
the  little  seaport,  what  with  the  railway 


i6 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


and  the  harbor-works,  than  at  any  other 
place  I  have  yet  seen ;  and  each  great 
undertaking  is  in  the  hands  of  men  of 
first-rate  ability  and  experience,  who  are 
as  persevering  as  they  are  energetic.  After 
looking  well  over  these  most  interesting 
plans  there  was  nothing  left  for  us  to  do 
except  to  make  a  sudden  raid  on  the 
hotel,  pick  up  our  shawls  and  bags,  pay 
a  most  moderate  bill  of  seven  shillings 
and  sixpence  for  breakfast  for  three  peo- 
ple and  luncheon  for  two,  and  the  use 
of  a  room  all  day,  piteously  entreat  the 
mistress  of  the  inn  to  sell  us  half  a  bot- 
tle of  milk  for  G 's  breakfast  to-mor- 
row— as  he  will  not  drink  the  preserved 
milk — and  so  back  again  on  board  the 
tug.  The  difficulty  about  milk  and  but- 
ter is  the  first  trouble  which  besets  a 
family  traveling  in  these  parts.  Every- 
where milk  is  scarce  and  poor,  and  the 
butter  such  as  no  'charwoman  would 
touch  in  England.  In  vain  does  one  be- 
hold from  the  sea  thousands  of  acres 
of  what  looks  like  undulating  green  pas- 
turage, and  inland  the  same  waving 
green  hillocks  stretch  as  far  as  the  eye 
can  reach :  there  is  never  a  sheep  or 
cow  to  be  seen,  and  one  hears  that  there 
is  no  water,  or  that  the  grass  is  sour, 
or  that  there  is  a  great  deal  of  sickness 
about  among  the  animals  in  that  local- 
ity. Whatever  the  cause,  the  result  is 
the  same — namely,  that  one  has  to  go 
down  on  one's  knees  for  a  cupful  of  milk, 
which  is  but  poor,  thin  stuff  at  its  best, 
and  that  Irish  salt  butter  out  of  a  tub  is 
a  costly  delicacy. 

Having  secured  this  precious  quarter 
of  a  bottle  of  milk,  for  which  I  was  real- 
ly as  grateful  as  though  it  had  been  the 
Koh-i-noor,  we  hastened  back  to  the 
wharf  and  got  on  board  the  little  tug 

again.    "  Now  for  the  bridge !"  cry  G 

and  I,  for  has  not  Captain  Florence  prom- 
ised us  a  splendid  but  safe  tossing  across 
the  bar  ?  And  faithfully  he  and  the  bar 
and  the  boat  keep  their  word,  for  we  are 
in  no  danger,  it  seems,  and  yet  we  ap- 
pear to  leap  like  a  race-horse  across  the 
strip  of  sand,  receiving  a  staggering  buf- 
fet first  on  one  paddle-wheel  and  then 
on  the  other  from  the  angry  guardian 
breakers,  which  seem  sworn  foes  of 


boats  and  passengers.  Again  and  again 
are  we  knocked  aside  by  huge  billows, 
as  though  the  poor  little  tug  were  a  wal- 
nut-shell ;  again  and  again  do  we  re- 
cover ourselves,  and  blunder  bravely  on, 
sometimes  with  but  one  paddle  in  the 
water,  sometimes  burying  our  bowsprit 
in  a  big  green  wave  too  high  to  climb, 
and  dashing  right  through  it  as  fast  as 
if  we  shut  our  eyes  and  went  at  every- 
thing. The  spray  flies  high  over  our 

heads,  G and  I  are  drenched  over 

and  over  again,  but  we  shake  the  spark- 
ling water  off  our  coats,  for  all  the  world 
like  Newfoundland  dogs,  and  are  all 
right  again  in  a  moment.  "  Is  that  the 

very  last  ?"  asks  G reluctantly  as  we 

take  our  last  breaker  like  a  five-barred 
gate,  flying,  and  find  ourselves  safe  and 
sound,  but  quivering  a  good  deal,  in  what 
seems  comparatively  smooth  water.  Is 
it  smooth,  though  ?  Look  at  the  Florence 
and  all  the  other  vessels.  Still  at  it,  see- 
saw, backward  and  forward,  roll,  roll, 
roll !  How  thankful  we  all  are  to  have 
escaped  a  long  day  of  sickening,  monot- 
onous motion !  But  there  is  the  get- 
ting on  board  to  be  accomplished,  for 
the  brave  little  tug  dare  not  come  too 
near  to  her  big  sister  steamboat  or  she 
would  roll  over  on  her.  So  we  signal  for 
a  boat,  and  quickly  the  largest  which  the 
Florence  possesses  is  launched  and  man- 
ned— no  easy  task  in  such  a  sea,  but  ac- 
complished in  the  smartest  and  most 
seamanlike.  fashion.  The  sides  of  the 
tug  are  low,  so  it  is  not  very  difficult  to 
scramble  and  tumble  into  the  boat,  which 
is  laden  to  the  water's  edge  by  new  pas- 
sengers from  East  London  and  their  lug- 
gage. When,  however,  we  have  reach- 
ed the  rolling  Florence  it  is  no  easy  mat- 
ter to  get  out  of  the  said  boat  and  on 
board.  There  is  a  ladder  let  down,  in- 
deed, from  the  Florence's  side,  but  how 
are  we  to  use  it  when  one  moment  half 
a  dozen  rungs  are  buried  deep  in  the 
sea,  and  the  next  instant  ship  and  ladder 
and  all  have  rolled  right  away  from  us  ? 
It  has  to  be  done,  however,  and  what  a 
tower  of  strength  and  encouragement 
does  "Capting  Florence"  prove  himself 
at  this  juncture  !  We  are  all  to  sit  per- 
fectly still :  no  one  is  to  move  until  his 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


name  is  called,  and  then  he  is  to  come 
unhesitatingly  and  do  exactly  what  he  is 
told. 

"  Pass  up  the  baby  !"  is  the  first  order 
which  I  hear  given,  and  that  astonishing 
baby  is  "  passed  up  "  accordingly.  I  use 
the  word  "astonishing"  advisedly,  for 
never  was  an  infant  so  bundled  about 
uncomplainingly.  He  is  just  as  often  up- 
side down  as  not ;  he  is  generally  hand- 
ed from  one  quartermaster  to  the  other 
by  the  gathers  of  his  little  blue  flannel 
frock ;  seas  break  over  his  cradle  on  deck, 
but  nothing  disturbs  him.  He  grins  and 
sleeps  and  pulls  at  his  bottle  through  ev- 
erything, and  grows  fatter  and  browner 
and  more  impudent  every  day.  On  this 
occasion,  when — after  rivaling  Leotard's 
most  daring  feats  on  the  trapeze  in  my 
scramble  up  the  side  of  a  vessel  which 
was  lurching  away  from  me — I  at  last 
reached  the  deck,  I  found  the  ship's  car- 
penter nursing  the  baby,  who  had  seized 
the  poor  man's  beard  firmly  with  one 
hand,  and  with  the  finger  and  thumb  of 
the  other  was  attempting  to  pick  out  one 
of  his  merry  blue  eyes.  "  Avast  there  !" 
cried  the  long-suffering  sailor,  and  gladly 
relinquished  the  mischievous  bundle  to 
me. 

Up  with  the  anchor,  and  off  we  go 
once  more  into  the  gathering  darkness 
of  what  turns  out  to  be  a  wet  and  windy 
night.  Next  day  the  weather  had  re- 
covered its  temper,  and  I  was  called  upon 
deck  directly  after  breakfast  to  see  the 
"Gates  of  St.  John,"  a  really  fine  pass 
on  the  coast  where  the  river  Umzimvubu 
rushes  through  great  granite  cliffs  into 
the  sea.  If  the  exact  truth  is  to  be  told, 
I  must  confess  I  am  a  little  disappointed 
with  this  coast-scenery.  I  have  heard 
so  much  of  its  beauty,  and  as  yet,  though 
I  have  seen  it  under  exceptionally  favor- 
able conditions  of  calm  weather,  which 
has  allowed  us  to  stand  in  very  close  to 
shore,  I  have  not  seen  anything  really  fine 
until  these  "Gates"  came  in  view.  It  has 
all  been  monotonous,  undulating  downs, 
here  and  there  dotted  with  trees,  and  in 
some  places  the  ravines  were  filled  with 
what  we  used  to  call  in  New  Zealand 
bush — i.  e.,  miscellaneous  greenery.  Here 
and  there  a  bold  cliff  or  tumbled  pile  of 


red  rock  makes  a  landmark  for  the  pass- 
ing ships,  but  otherwise  the  uniformity  is 
great  indeed.  The  ordinary  weather 
along  this  coast  is  something  frightful, 
and  the  great  reputation  of  our  little 
Florence  is  built  on  the  method  in  which 
she  rides  dry  and  safe  as  a  duck  among 
these  stormy  waters.  Now  that  we  are 
close  to  "fair  Natal,"  the  country  opens 
out  and  improves  in  beauty.  There  are 
still  the  same  sloping,  rolling  downs,  but 
higher  downs  rise  behind  them,  and  again 
beyond  are  blue  and  purpling  hills.  Here 
and  there,  too,  are  clusters  of  fat,  dumpy 
haystacks,  which  in  reality  are  no  hay- 
stacks at  all,  but  Kafir  kraals.  Just  be- 
fore we  pass  the  cliff  and  river  which 
marks  where  No-Man's  Land  ends  and 
Natal  begins  these  little  locations  are 
more  frequently  to  be  observed,  though 
what  their  inhabitants  subsist  on  is  a 
marvel  to  me,  for  we  are  only  a  mile  or 
so  from  shore,  and  all  the  seeing  power 
of  all  the  field-glasses  on  board  fails  to 
discern  a  solitary  animal.  We  can  see 
lots  of  babies  crawling  about  the  hole 
which  serves  as  door  to  a  Kafir  hut,  and 
they  are  all  as  fat  as  little  pigs  ;  but  what 
do  they  live  on  ?  Buttermilk,  I  am' told — 
that  is  to  say,  sour  milk,  for  the  true  Kafir 
palate  does  not  appreciate  fresh,  sweet 
milk — and  a  sort  of  porridge  made  of 
mealies.  I  used  to  think  "mealies  "  was 
a  coined  word  for  potatoes,  but  it  really 
signifies  maize  or  Indian  corn,  which  is 
rudely  crushed  and  ground,  and  forms 
the  staple  food  of  man  and  beast. 

In  the  mean  time,  we  are  speeding 
gayly  over  the  bright  waters,  never  very 
calm  along  this  shore.  Presently  we 
come  to  a  spot  clearly  marked  by  some 
odd-colored,  tumbled-down  cliffs  and  the 
remains  of  a  great  iron  butt,  where,  more 
than  a  hundred  years  ago,  the  Grosvenor, 
a  splendid  clipper  ship,  was  wrecked. 
The  men  nearly  all  perished  or  were 
made  away  with,  but  a  few  women  were 
got  on  shore  and  carried  off  as  prizes  to 
the  kraals  of  the  Kafir  "  inkosis"  or  chief- 
tains. What  sort  of  husbands  these  stal- 
wart warriors  made  to  their  reluctant 
brides  tradition  does  not  say,  but  it  is 
a  fact  that  almost  all  the  children  were 
born  mad,  and  their  descendants  are, 


i8 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


many  of  them,  lunatics  or  idiots  up  to 
the  present  time.  As  the  afternoon  draws 
on  a  chill  mist  creeps  over  the  hills  and 
provokingly  blots  out  the  coast,  which 
gets  more  beautiful  every  league  we  go. 
I  wanted  to  remain  up  and  see  the  light 
on  the  bluff  just  outside  Port  d'Urban, 
but  a  heavy  shower  drove  me  down  to 
my  wee  cabin  before  ten  o'clock.  Soon 
after  midnight  the  rolling  of  the  anchor- 
chains  and  the  sudden  change  of  motion 
from  pitching  and  jumping  to  the  old 
monotonous  roll  told  us  that  we  were  once 
more  outside  a  bar,  with  a  heavy  sea  on, 
and  that  there  we  must  remain  until  the 
tug  came  to  fetch  us.  But,  alas  !  the  tug 
had  to  make  short  work  of  it  next  morn- 
ing, on  account  of  the  unaccommodating 
state  of  the  tide,  and  all  our  hopes  of 
breakfasting  on  shore  were  dashed  by  a 
hasty  announcement  at  5  A.  M.  that  the 
tug  was  alongside,  the  mails  were  rapid- 
ly being  put  on  board  of  her,  and  that 
she  could  not  wait  for  passengers  or 
anything  else,  because  ten  minutes  later 
there  would  not  be  water  enough  to  float 
her  over  the  bar. 

"  When  shall  we  be  able  to  get  over 
the  bar  ?"  I  asked  dolefully. 

"Not  until  the  afternoon,"  was  the 
prompt  and  uncompromising  reply,  de- 
livered through  my  .keyhole  by  the  au- 
thority in  charge  of  us.  And  he  proved 
to  be  quite  right ;  but  I  am  bound  to  say 
the  time  passed  more  quickly  than  we 
had  dared  to  hope  or  expect,  for  an  hour 
later  a  bold  little  fishing-boat  made  her 
way  through  the  breakers  and  across  the 
bar  in  the  teeth  of  wind  and  rain,  bring- 
ing F on  board.  He  has  been  out 

here  these  eight  months,  and  looks  a 
walking  advertisement  of  the  climate 
and  temperature  of  our  new  home,  so 
absolutely  healthy  is  his  appearance.  He 
is  very  cheery  about  liking,  the  place, 
and  particularly  insists  on  the  blooming 
faces  and  sturdy  limbs  I  shall  see  belong- 
ing to  the  young  Natalians.  Altogether, 
he  appears  thoroughly  happy  and  con- 
tented, liking  his  work,  his  position,  ev- 
erything and  everybody  ;  which  is  all 
extremely  satisfactory  to  hear.  There  is 
so  much  to  tell  and  so  much  to  behold 
that,  as  G declares,  "it  is  afternoon 


directly,"  and,  the  signal-flag  being  up, 
we  trip  our  anchor  once  more  and  rush 
at  the  bar,  two  quartermasters  and  an 
officer  at  the  wheel,  the  pilot  and  captain 
on  the  bridge,  all  hands  on  deck  and  on 
the  alert,  for  always,  under  the  most 
favorable  circumstances,  the  next  five 
minutes  hold  a  peril  in  every  second. 
"  Stand  by  for  spray  !"  sings  out  some- 
body, and  we  do  stand  by,  luckily  for 
ourselves,  for  "spray  "  means  the  top  of 
two  or  three  waves.  The  dear  little 
Florence  is  as  plucky  as  she  is  pretty, 
and  appears  to  shut  her  eyes  and  lower 
her  head  and  go  at  the  bar.  Scrape, 
scrape,  scrape  !  "We've  stuck  !  No,  we 
haven't!  Helm  hard  down!  Over!" 
and  so  we  are.  Among  the  breakers,  it 
is  true,  buffeted  hither  and  thither,  knock- 
ed first  to  one  side  and  then  to  the  other ; 
but  we  keep  right  on,  and  a  few  more 
turns  of  the  screw  take  us  into  calm 
water  under  the  green  hills  of  the  bluff. 
The  breakers  are  behind  us,  we  have 
twenty  fathoms  of  water  under  our  keel, 
the  voyage  is  ended  and  over,  the  cap- 
tain takes  off  his  straw  hat  to  mop  his 
curly  head,  everybody's  face  loses  the 
expression  of  anxiety  and  rigidity  it  has 
worn  these  past  ten  minutes,  and  boats 
swarm  like  locusts  round  the  ship.  The 
baby  is  passed  over  the  ship's  side  for 
the  last  time,  having  been  well  kissed 
and  petted  and  praised  by  every  one  as 
he  was  handed  from  one  to  the  other, 
and  we  row  swiftly  away  to  the  low 
sandy  shore  of  the  "Point." 

Only  a  few  warehouses,  or  rather  sheds 
of  warehouses,  are  to  be  seen,  and  a  rude 
sort  of  railway-station,  which  appears  to 
afford  indiscriminate  shelter  to  boats  as 
well  as  to  engines.  There  are  leisurely 
trains  which  saunter  into  the  town  of 
D'Urban,  a  mile  and  a  half  away,  every 
half  hour  or  so,  but  one -of  these  "crawl- 
ers" had  just  started.  The  sun  was  very 
hot,  and  we  voyagers  were  all  sadly 
weary  and  headachy.  But  the  best  of 
the  colonies  is  the  prompt,  self-sacrificing 
kindness  of  old-comers  to  new-comers. 
A  gentleman  had  driven  down  in  his 
own  nice,  comfortable  pony  -  carriage, 
and  without  a  moment's  hesitation  he 
insisted  on  our  all  getting  into  it  and 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


making  the  best  of  our  way  to  our  hotel. 
It  is  too  good  an  offer  to  be  refused,  for 
the  sun  is  hot  and  the  babies  are  tired  to 
death;  so  we  start,  slowly  enough,  to 
plough  our  way  through  heavy  sand  up 
to  the  axles.  If  the  tide  had  been  out 
we  could  have  driven  quickly  along  the 
hard,  dry  sand;  but  we  comfort  our- 
selves by  remembering  that  there  had 
been  water  enough  on  the  bar,  and  make 
the  best  of  our  way  through  clouds  of  im- 
palpable dust  to  a  better  road,  of  which 
a  couple  of  hundred  yards  land  us  at 
our  hotel.  It  looks  bare  and  unfurnished 
enough,  in  all  conscience,  but  it  is  a  new 
place,  and  must  be  furnished  by  degrees. 
At  all  events,  it  is  tolerably  clean  and 
quiet,  and  we  can  wash  our  sunburned 
faces  and  hands,  and,  as  nurse  says, 
"turn  ourselves  round." 

Coolies  swarm  in  every  direction,  pic- 
turesque fish-  and  fruit-sellers  throng  the 
verandah  of  the  kitchen  a  little  way  off, 
and  everything  looks  bright  and  green 
and  fresh,  having  been  well  washed  by 
the  recent  rains.  There  are  still,  however, 
several  feet  of  dust  in  the  streets,  for  they 
are  made  of  dust ;  and  my  own  private 
impression  is,  that  all  the  water  in  the 
harbor  would  not  suffice  to  lay  the  dust 
of  D' Urban  for  more  than  half  an  hour. 
With  the  restlessness  of  people  who  have 
been  cooped  up  on  board  ship  for  a 
month,  we  insist,  the  moment  it  is  cool 
enough,  on  being  taken  out  for  a  walk. 
Fortunately,  the  public  gardens  are  close 
at  hand,  and  we  amuse  ourselves  very 
well  in  them  for  an  hour  or  two,  but  we 
are  all  thoroughly  tired  and  worn  out, 
and  glad  to  get  to  bed,  even  in  gaunt, 
narrow  rooms  on  hard  pallets. 

The  two  following  days  were  spent  in 
looking  after  and  collecting  our  cum- 
brous array  of  boxes  and  baskets.  Tin 
baths,  wicker  chairs  and  baskets,  all  had 
to  be  counted  and  recounted,  until  one 
got  weary  of  the  word  "luggage;"  but 
that  is  the  penalty  of  drafting  babies 
about  the  world.  In  the  intervals  of  the 
serious  business  of  tracing  No.  5  or  run- 
ning No.  10  to  earth  in  the  corner  of  a 
warehouse,  I  made  many  pleasant  ac- 
quaintances and  received  kindest  words 
and  notes  of  welcome  from  unknown 


friends.  All  this  warm-hearted,  uncon- 
ventional kindness  goes  far  to  make  the 
stranger  forget  his  "own  people  and  his 
father's  house,"  and  feel  at  once  at  home 
amid  strange  and  unfamiliar  scenes. 
After  all,  "home"  is  portable,  luckily, 
and  a  welcoming  smile  and  hand-clasp 
act  as  a  spell  to  create  it  in  any  place. 
We  also  managed,  after  business-hours, 
when  it  was  of  no  use  making  expeditions 
to  wharf  or  custom-house  after  recusant 
carpet-bags,  to  drive  to  the  Botanic  Gar- 
dens. They  are  extensive  and  well  kept, 
but  seem  principally  devoted  to  shrubs. 
I  was  assured  that  this  is  the  worst  time 
of  year  for  flowers,  as  the  plants  have  not 
yet  recovered  from  the  winter  drought. 
A  dry  winter  and  wet  summer  is  the  cor- 
rect atmospheric  fashion  here :  in  winter 
everything  is  brown  and  dusty  and  dried 
up,  in  summer  green  and  fragrant  and 
well  watered.  The  gardens  are  in  good 
order,  and  I  rather  regretted  not  being 
able  to  examine  them  more  thoroughly. 
Another  afternoon  we  drove  to  the  Berea, 
a  sort  of  suburban  Richmond,  where  the 
rich  semi-tropical  vegetation  is  cleared 
away  in  patches,  and  villas  with  pretty 
pleasure-grounds  are  springing  up  in 
every  direction.  The  road  winds  up  the 
luxuriantly  -  clothed  slopes,  with  every 
here  and  there  lovely  sea-views  of  the 
harbor,  with  the  purpling  lights  of  the 
Indian  Ocean  stretching  away  beyond. 
Every  villa  must  have  an  enchanting 
prospect  from  its  front  door,  and  one  can 
quite  understand  how  alluring  to  the 
merchants  and  business -men  of  D'Ur- 
ban  must  be  the  idea  of  getting  away 
after  office-hours,  and  sleeping  on  such 
high  ground  in  so  fresh  and  healthy  an 
atmosphere.  And  here  I  must  say  that 
we  Maritzburgians  (I  am  only  one  in 
prospective)  wage  a  constant  and  dead- 
ly warfare  with  the  D'Urbanites  on  the 
score  of  the  health  and  convenience  of 
our  respective  cities.  We  are  two  thou- 
sand feet  above  the  sea  and  fifty-two 
miles  inland,  so  we  talk  in  a  pitying  tone 
of  the  poor  D'Urbanites  as  dwellers  in  a 
very  hot  and  unhealthy  place.  "  Relax- 
ing" is  the  word  we  apply  to  their  cli- 
mate when  we  want  to  be  particularly 
nasty,  and  they  retaliate  by  reminding 


20 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


us  that  they  are  ever  so  much  older  than 
we  are  (which  is  an  advantage  in  a  col- 
ony), and  that  they  are  on  the  coast,  and 
can  grow  all  manner  of  nice  things  which 
we  cannot  compass,  to  say  nothing  of 
their  climate  being  more  equable  than 
ours,  and  their  thunderstorms,  though 
longer  in  duration,  mere  flashes  in  the 
pan  compared  to  what  we  in  our  amphi- 
theatre of  hills  have  to  undergo  at  the 
hands  of  the  electric  current.  We  never 
can  find  answer  to  that  taunt,  and  if  the 
D'Urbanites  only  follow  up  their  victory 
by  allusions  to  their  abounding  bananas 
and  other  fruits,  their  vicinity  to  the  ship- 
ping, and  consequent  facility  of  getting 
almost  anything  quite  easily,  we  are  com- 
pletely silenced,  and  it  is  a  wonder  if  we 
retain  presence  of  mind  enough  to  mur- 
mur "  Flies."  On  the  score  of  dust  we  are 
about  equal,  but  I  must  in  fairness  confess 
that  D'Urban  is  a  more  lively  and  a  bet- 
ter-looking town  than  Maritzburg  when 
you  are  in  it,  though  the  effect  from  a  dis- 
tance is  not  so  good.  It  is  very  odd  how 
unevenly  the  necessaries  of  existence  are 
distributed  in  this  country.  Here  at  D'Ur- 
ban anything  hard  in  the  way  of  stone  is 
a  treasure :  everything  is  soft  and  friable : 
sand  and  finest  shingle,  so  fine  as  to  be 
mere  dust,  are  all  the  available  material 
for  road-making.  I  am  told  that  later  on 
I  shall  find  that  a  cartload  of  sand  in 
Maritzburg  is  indeed  a  rare  and  costly 
thing:  there  we  are  all  rock,  a  sort  of 
flaky,  slaty  rock  underlying  every  place. 
Our  last  day,  or  rather  half  day,  in 
D'Urban  was  very  full  of  sightseeing 
and  work.  F was  extremely  anx- 
ious for  me  to  see  the  sun  rise  from  the 
signal-station  on  the  bluff,  and  accord- 
ingly he,  G and  I  started  with  the 

earliest  dawn.  We  drove  through  the 
sand  again  in  a  hired  and  springless 
Cape  cart  down  to  the  Ppint,  got  into  the 
port -captain's  boat  and  rowed  across  a 
little  strip  of  sand  at  the  foot  of  a  wind- 
ing path  cut  out  of  the  dense  vegetation 
which  makes  the  bluff  such  a  refreshing- 
ly green  headland  to  eyes  of  wave-worn 
voyagers.  A  stalwart  Kafir  carried  our 
picnic  basket,  with  tea  and  milk,  bread 
and  butter  and  eggs,  up  the  hill,  and  it 
was  delightful  to  follow  the  windings  of 


the  path  through  beautiful  bushes  bear- 
ing strange  and  lovely  flowers,  and  knit 
together  in  patches  in  a  green  tangle  by 
the  tendrils  of  a  convolvulus  or  clematis, 
or  sort  of  wild  passion-flower,  whose  blos- 
soms were  opening  to  the  fresh  morning 
air.  It  was  a  cool  but  misty  morning,  and 
though  we  got  to  our  destination  in  am- 
ple time,  there  was  never  any  sunrise  at 
all  to  be  seen.  In  fact,  the  sun  steadily 
declined  to  get  up  the  whole  day,  so  far 
as  I  knew,  for  the  sea  looked  gray  and 
solemn  and  sleepy,  and  the  land  kept  its 
drowsy  mantle  of  haze  over  its  flat  shore ; 
which  haze  thickened  and  deepened  into 
a  Scotch  mist  as  the  morning  wore  on. 
We  returned  by  the  leisurely  railway — a 
railway  so  calm  and  stately  in  its  method 
of  progression  that  it  is  not  at  all  unusual 
to  see  a  passenger  step  calmly  out  of  the 
train  when  it  is  at  its  fullest  speed  of  crawl, 
and  wave  his  hand  to  his  companions  as 
he  disappears  down  the  by-path  leading 
to  his  little  home.  The  passengers  are 
conveyed  at  a  uniform  rate  of  sixpence 
a  head,  which  sixpence  is  collected  pro- 
miscuously by  a  small  boy  at  odd  mo- 
ments during  the  journey.  There  are 
no  nice  distinctions  of  class,  either,  for 
we  all  travel  amicably  together  in  com- 
partments which  are  a  judicious  mixture 
of  a  third-class  carriage  and  a  cattle- 
truck.  Of  course,  wood  is  the  only  fuel 
used,  and  that  but  sparingly,  for  it  is  ex- 
ceedingly costly. 

There  was  still  much  to  be  done  by 
the  afternoon — many  visitors  to  receive, 
notes  to  write  and  packages  to  arrange, 
for  our  traveling  of  these  fifty-two  miles 
spreads  itself  over  a  good  many  hours, 
as  you  will  see.  About  three  o'clock  the 
government  mule -wagon  came  to  the 
door.  It  may  truly  and  literally  be  de- 
scribed as  "stopping  the  way,"  for  not 
only  is  the  wagon  itself  a  huge  and  cum- 
brous machine,  but  it  is  drawn  by  eight 
mules  in  pairs,  and  driven  by  a  couple 
of  black  drivers.  \  say  "driven  by  a 
couple  of  drivers,"  because  the  driving 
was  evidently  an  affair  of  copartnership  : 
one  held  the  reins — such  elaborate  reins 
as  they  were !  a  confused  tangle  of  leath- 
er —  and  the  other  had  the  care  of  two 
or  three  whips  of  differing  lengths.  The 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


21 


drivers  were  both  jet  black — not  Kafirs, 
but  Cape  blacks — descendants  of  the  old 
slaves  taken  by  the  Dutch.  They  ap- 
peared to  be  great  friends,  these  two, 
and  took  earnest  counsel  together  at  ev- 
ery rut  and  drain  and  steep  pinch  of  the 
road,  which  stretched  away,  over  hill  and 
dale,  before  us,  a  broad  red  track,  with 
high  green  hedges  on  either  hand.  Al- 
though the  rain  had  not  yet  fallen  long 
or  heavily,  the  ditches  were  all  running 
freely  with  red,  muddy  water,  and  the 
dust  had  already  begun  to  cake  itself 
into  a  sticky,  pasty  red  clay.  The  wagon 
was  shut  in  by  curtains  at  the  back  and 
sides,  and  could  hold  eight  passengers 
easily.  Luckily  for  the  poor  mules,  how- 
ever, we  were  only  five  grown-up  people, 
including  the  drivers.  The  road  was  ex- 
tremely pretty,  and  the  town  looked  very 
picturesque  as  we  gradually  rose  above 
it  and  looked  down  on  it  and  the  harbor 
together.  Of  a  fine,  clear  afternoon  it 
would  have  been  still  nicer,  though  I  was 
much  congratulated  on  the  falling  rain  on 
account  of  the  absence  of  its  alternative 
— dust.  Still,  it  was  possible  to  have  too 
much  of  a  good  thing,  and  by  the  time 
we  reached  Pine  Town,  only  fourteen 
miles  away,  the  heavy  roads  were  begin- 
ning to  tell  on  the  poor  mules,  and  the 
chill  damp  of  the  clqsing  evening  made 
us  all  only  too  thankful  to  get  under  the 
shelter  of  a  roadside  inn  (or  hotel,  as 
they  are  called  here),  which  was  snug 
and  bright  and  comfortable  enough  to 
be  a  credit  to  any  colony.  It  seemed 
the  most  natural  thing  in  the  world  to  be 
told  that  this  inn  was  not  only  a  favorite 
place  for  people  to  come  out  to  from 
D'Urban  to  spend  their  holiday  time  in 
fine  weather  (there  is  a  pretty  little  church 
in  the  village  hard  by),  but  also  that  it 
was  quite  de  rigueur  for  all  honeymoons 
to  be  spent  amid  its  pretty  scenery. 

A  steady  downpour  of  rain  all  through 
the  night  made  our  early  start  next  day 
an  affair  of  doubt  and  discouragement 
and  dismal  prophecy ;  but  we  persevered, 
and  accomplished  another  long  stage 
through  a  cold  persistent  drizzle  before 
reaching  an  inn,  where  we  enjoyed  sim- 
ply the  best  breakfast  I  ever  tasted,  or 
at  all  events  the  best  I  have  tasted  in 


Natal.  The  mules  were  also  unharness- 
ed, and  after  taking,  each,  a  good  roll 
on  the  damp  grass,  turned  out  in  the 
drizzling  rain  for  a  rest  and  a  nibble 
until  their  more  substantial  repast  was 
ready.  The  rain  cleared  up  from  time 
to  time,  but  an  occasional  heavy  shower 
warned  us  that  the  weather  was  still 
sulky.  It  was  in  much  better  heart  and 
spirits,  however,  that  we  made  a  second 
start  about  eleven  o'clock,  and  struggled 
on  through  heavy  roads  up  and  down 
weary  hills,  slipping  here,  sliding  there, 
and  threatening  to  stick  everywhere. 
Our  next  stage  was  to  a  place  where  the 
only  available  shelter  was  a  filthy  inn, 
at  which  we  lingered  as  short  a  time  as 
practicable — only  long  enough,  in  fact, 
to  feed  the  mules — and  then,  with  every 
prospect  of  a  finer  afternoon,  set  out  once 
more  on  the  last  and  longest  stage  of  our 
journey.  All  the  way  the  road  has  been 
very  beautiful,  in  spite  of  the  shrouding 
mist,  especially  at  the  Inchanga  Pass, 
where  round  the  shoulder  of  the  hill  as 
fair  a  prospect  of  curved  green  hills,  dot- 
ted with  clusters  of  timber  exactly  like 
an  English  park,  of  distant  ranges  rising 
in  softly-rounded  outlines,  with  deep  vio- 
let shadows  in  the  clefts  and  pale  green 
lights  on  the  slopes,  stretches  before  you 
as  the  heart  of  painter  could  desire.  Nest- 
ling out  of  sight  amid  this  rich  pasture- 
land  are  the  kraals  of  a  large  Kafir  loca- 
tion, and  no  one  can  say  that  these,  the 
children  of  the  soil,  have  not  secured  one 
of  the  most  favored  spots.  To  me  it  all 
looked  like  a  fair  mirage.  I  am  already 
sick  of  beholding  all  this  lovely  country 
lying  around,  and  yet  of  being  told  that 
food  and  fuel  are  almost  at  famine-prices. 
People  say,  "Oh,  but  you  should  see  it 
in  winter.  Now  it  is  green,  and  there  is 
plenty  of  feed  on  it,  but  three  months 
ago  no  grass-eating  creature  could  have 
picked  up  a  living  on  all  the  country-side. 
It  is  all  as  brown  and  bare  as  parchment 
for  half  the  year.  This  is  the  spring." 
Can  you  not  imagine  how  provoking  it 
is  to  hear  such  statements  made  by  old 
settlers,  who  know  the  place  only  too 
well,  and  to  find  out  that  all  the  radiant 
beauty  which  greets  the  traveler's  eye 
is  illusive,  for  in  many  places  there  are 


22 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


miles  and  miles  without  a  drop  of  water 
for  the  flock  and  herds;  consequently, 
there  are  no  means  of  transport  for  all 
t^iis  fuel  until  the  days  of  railways  ?  Be- 
sides which,  through  Natal  lies  the  great 
highway  to  the  Diamond  Fields,  the 
Transvaal  and  the  Free  States,  and  all 
the  opening-up  country  beyond  ;  so  it  is 
more  profitable  to  drive  a  wagon  than  to 
till  a  farm.  Every  beast  with  four  legs 
is  wanted  to  drag  building  materials  or 
provisions.  The  supply  of  beef  becomes 
daily  more  precarious  and  costly,  for  the 
oxen  are  all  "treking,"  and  one  hears 
of  nothing  but  diseases  among  animals 
— "  horse  sickness,"  pleuro-pneumonia, 
fowl  sickness  (I  feel  it  an  impertinence 
for  the  poultry  to  presume  to  be  ill),  and 
even  dogs  set  up  a  peculiar  and  fatal  sort 
of  distemper  among  themselves. 

But  to  return  to  the  last  hours  of  our 
journey.  The  mules  struggle  bravely 
along,  though  their  ears  are  beginning 
to  flap  about  any  way,  instead  of  being 
held  straight  and  sharply  pricked  for- 
ward, and  the  encouraging  cries  of  "Pull 
up,  Capting !  now  then,  Blue-bok,  hi!" 


become  more  and  more  frequent:  the 
driver  in  charge  of  the  whips  is  less  nice 
in  his  choice  of  a  scourge  with  which  to 
urge  on  the  patient  animals,  and  whacks 
them  soundly  with  whichever  comes  first. 
The  children  have  long  ago  wearied  of 
the  confinement  and  darkness  of  the 
back  seats  of  the  hooded  vehicle;  we 
are  all  black  and  blue  from  jolting  in 
and  out  of  deep  holes  hidden  by  mud 
which  occur  at  every  yard ;  but  still  our 
flagging  spirits  keep  pretty  good,  for  our 
little  Table  Mountain  has  been  left  be- 
hind, whilst  before  us,  leaning  up  in  one 
corner  of  an  amphitheatre  of  hills,  are 
the  trees  which  mark  where  Maritzburg 
nestles.  The  mules  see  it  too,  and,  snif- 
fing their  stables  afar  off,  jog  along  faster. 
Only  one  more  rise  to  pull  up :  we  turn 
a  little  off  the  high-road,  and  there,  amid 
a  young  plantation  of  trees,  with  roses, 
honeysuckle  and  passion-flowers  climb- 
ing up  the  posts  of  the  wide  verandah,  a 
fair  and  enchanting  prospect  lying  at  our 
feet,  stands  our  new  home,  with  its  broad 
red  tiled  roof  stretching  out  a  friendly 
welcome  to  the  tired,  belated  travelers. 


MARITZBURG,  November,  1875. 

THE  weather  at  the  beginning  of  this 
month  was  lovely  and  the  climate 
perfection,  but  now  (I  am  writing  on  its 
last  day)  it  is  getting  very  hot  and  try- 
ing. If  ever  people  might  stand  excused 
for  talking  about  the  weather  when  they 
meet,  it  is  we  Natalians,  for,  especially  at 
this  time  of  year,  it  varies  from  hour  to 
hour.  All  along  the  coast  one  hears  of 
terrible  buffeting  and  knocking  about 
among  the  shipping  in  the  open  road- 
steads which  have  to  do  duty  for  harbors 
in  these  parts  ;  and  it  was  only  a  few 
days  ago  that  the  lifeboat,  with  the  Eng- 
lish mail  on  board,  capsized  in  crossing 
the  bar  at  D'Urban.  The  telegram  was 
— as  telegrams  always  are — terrifying  in 
its  vagueness,  and  spoke  of  the  mail-bags 
as  "  floating  about."  When  one  remem- 
bers the  vast  size  of  the  breakers  on  which 
this  floating  would  take  place,  it  sounded 
hopeless  for  our  letters.  They  turned  up, 
however,  a  few  days  later  —  in  a  pulpy 
state,  it  is  true,  but  quite  readable,  though 
the  envelopes  were  curiously  blended  and 
engrafted  upon  the  letters  inside  —  so 
much  so  that  they  required  to  be  taken 
together,  for  it  was  impossible  to  separate 
them.  I  had  recourse  to  the  expedient 
of  spreading  my  letters  on  a  dry  towel 
and  draining  them  before  attempting  to 
dissever  the  leaves.  Still,  we  were  all 
only  too  thankful  to  get  our  correspond- 
ence in  any  shape  or  form,  for  precious 
beyond  the  power  of  words  to  express 
are  home-letters  to  us,  so  far  away  from 
home. 

But  to  return  to  our  weather.  At  first 
it  was  simply  perfect.  Bright  hot  days — 
not  too  hot,  for  a  light  breeze  tempered 
even  the  midday  heat  —  and  crisp,  bra- 
cing nights  succeeded  each  other  durfng 
the  first  fortnight.  The  country  looked 
exquisitely  green  in  its  luxuriant  spring 
tints  over  hill  and  dale,  and  the  rich  red 
clay  soil  made  a  splendid  contrast  on 
road  and  track  with  the  brilliant  green 


on  either  hand.  Still,  people  looked 
anxiously  for  more  rain,  declaring  that 
not  half  enough  had  fallen  to  fill  tanks 
or  "shuits"  (as  the  ditches  are  called), 
and  it  took  four  days  of  continuous  down- 
pour to  satisfy  these  thirsty  souls  even 
for  the  moment.  Toward  the  middle  of 
the  month  the  atmosphere  became  more 
oppressive  and  clouds  began  to  come  up 
in  thick  masses  all  round  the  horizon, 
and  gradually  spread  themselves^over  the 
whole  sky.  The  day  before  the  heaviest 
rain,  though  not  particularly  oppressive, 
was  remarkable  for  the  way  in  which  all 
manner  of  animals  tried  to  get  under 
shelter  at  nightfall.  The  verandah  was 
full  of  big  frogs  :  if  a  door  remained  open 
for  a  moment  they  hopped  in,  and  then 
cried  like  trapped  birds  when  they  found 
themselves  in  a  corner.  As  for  the  wing- 
ed creatures,  it  was  something  wonderful 
the  numbers  in  which  they  flew  in  at  the 
windows  wherever  a  light  attracted  them. 
I  was  busy  writing  English  letters  that 
evening :  I  declare  the  cockroaches  fair- 
ly drove  me  away  from  the  table  by  the 
mad  way  in  which  they  flung  themselves 
into  my  ink-bottle,  whilst  the  smell  of 
singed  moths  at  the  other  lamp  was  quite 
overpowering.  Well,  after  this  came 
rain  indeed — not  rain  according  to  Eng- 
lish ideas,  but  a  tropical  deluge,  as  many 
inches  falling  in  a  few  hours  as  would 
fill  your  rain-gauges  for  months.  I  be- 
lieve my  conduct  was  very  absurd  that 
first  rainy  night.  The  little  house  had 
just  been  newly  papered,  and  as  the 
ceiling  was  not  one  to  inspire  confidence, 
consisting  as  it  did  merely  of  boards 
roughly  joined  together  and  painted 
white,  through  which  and  through  the 
tiles  beyond  the  sky  could  be  seen  quite 
plainly,  I  suffered  the  gravest  doubts 
about  the  water  getting  in  and  spoil- 
ing my  pretty  new  paper.  Accordingly, 
whenever  any  burst  of  rain  came  heavier 
than  its  immediate  predecessor,  I  jump- 
i  ed  out  of  bed  in  a  perfect  agony  of  mind, 

23 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


and  roamed,  candle  in  hand,  all  over  the 
house  to  see  if  I  could  not  detect  a  leak 
anywhere.  But  the  unpromising-look- 
ing roof  and  ceiling  stood  the  test  brave- 
ly, and  not  a  drop  of  all  that  descend- 
ing downpour  found  its  way  to  my  new 
walls. 

By  the  way,  I  must  describe  the  house 
to  you,  remarking,  first  of  all,  that  archi- 
tecture, so  far  as  my  observation  extends, 
is  at  its  lowest  ebb  in  South  Africa.  I 
have  not  seen  a  single  pretty  building  of 
any  sort  or  kind  since  I  arrived,  although 
in  these  small  houses  it  would  be  so  easy 
to  break  by  gable  and  porch  the  severe 
simplicity  of  the  unvarying  straight  line 
in  which  they  are  built.  Whitewashed 
outer  walls  with  a  zinc  roof  are  not  un- 
common, and  they  make  a  bald  and  hid- 
eous combination  until  kindly,  luxuriant 
Nature  has  had  time  to  step  in  and  cover 
up  man's  ugly  handiwork  with  her  fes- 
toons of  roses  and  passion-flowers.  Most 
of  the  houses  have,  fortunately,  red-tiled 
roofs,  which  are  not  so  ugly,  and  mine  is 
among  the  number.  It  is  so  squat  and 
square,  however,  that,  as  our  landlord 
happens  to  be  the  chief  baker  of  Ma- 
ritzburg,  it  has  been  proposed  to  christen 
it  "Cottage  Loaf,"  but  this  idea  requires 
consideration  on  account  of  the  baker's 
feelings.  In  the  mean  time,  it  is  known 
briefly  as  "Smith's,"  that  being  the 
landlord's  name.  It  has,  as  all  the 
houses  here  have,  a  broad  projecting 
roof  extending  over  a  wide  verandah. 
Within  are  four  small  rooms,  two  on 
either  side  of  a  narrow  passage  which  runs 
from  one  end  to  the  other.  By  a  happy 
afterthought,  a  kitchen  has  been  added 
beyond  this  extremely  simple  ground- 
plan,  and  on  the  opposite  side  a  corre- 
sponding projection  which  closely  resem- 
bles a  packing-case,  and  which  has  been 
painted  a  bright  blue  inside  and  out. 
This  is  the  dining-room,  and  evidently 
requires  to  be  severely  handled  before 
its  present  crude  and  glaring  tints  can 
be  at  all  toned  down.  At  a  little  distance 
stands  the  stable,  saddle-room,  etc.,  and 
a  good  bedroom  for  English  servants, 
and  beyond  that,  again,  among  large 
clumps  of  rose-bushes,  a  native  hut.  It 
came  up  here  half  built — that  is,  the 


frame  was  partly  put  together  elsewhere 
— and  it  resembled  a  huge  crinoline  more 
than  anything  else  in  its  original  state. 
Since  that,  however,  it  has  been  made 
more  secure  by  extra  pales  of  bamboo, 
each  tied  in  its  place  with  infinite  trouble 
and  patience  by  a  knot  every  inch  or 
two.  The  final  stage  consisted  of  care- 
ful thatching  with  thick  bundles  of  grass 
laid  on  the  framework,  and  secured  by 
long  ropes  of  grass  binding  the  whole 
together.  The  door  is  the  very  smallest 
opening  imaginable,  and  inside  it  is  of 
course  pitch  dark.  All  this  labor  was 
performed  by  stalwart  Kafir  women,  one 
of  whom,  a  fearfully  repulsive  female,  in- 
formed my  cook  that  she  had  just  been 
bought  back  by  her  original  husband. 
Stress  of  circumstances  had  obliged  him 
to  sell  her,  and  she  had  been  bought  by 
three  other  husband-masters  since  then, 
but  was  now  resold,  a  bargain,  to  her 
first  owner,  whom,  she  declared,  she  pre- 
ferred to  any  of  the  others.  But  few  as 
are  these  rooms,  they  yet  are  watertight 
— which  is  a  great  point  out  here — and 
the  house,  being  built  of  large,  awkward 
blocks  of  stone,  is  cool  and  shady.  When 
I  have  arranged  things  a  little,  it  will  be 
quite  comfortable  and  pretty  ;  and  I  defy 
any  one  to  wish  for  a  more  exquisite  view 
than  can  be  seen  from  any  corner  of  the 
verandah.  We  are  on  the  brow  of  a  hill 
which  slopes  gently  down  to  the  hollow 
wherein  nestles  the  picturesque  little 
town,  or  rather  village,  of  Maritzburg. 
The  intervening  distance  of  a  mile  or  so 
conceals  the  real  ugliness  and  monotony 
of  its  straight  streets,  and  hides  all  archi- 
tectural shortcomings.  The  clock-tower, 
for  instance,  is  quite  a  feature  in  the  land- 
scape, and  from  here  one  cannot  per- 
ceive that  the  clock  does  not  go.  Noth- 
ing can  be  prettier  than  the  effect  of  the 
red-tiled  roofs  and  white  walls  peeping  out 
from  among  thick  clumps  of  trees,  whilst 
beyond  the  ground  rises  again  to  low 
hills  with  deep  purple  fissures  and  clefts 
in  their  green  sides.  It  is  only  a  couple 
of  years  since  this  little  house  was  built 
and  the  garden  laid  out,  and  yet  the  shrubs 
and  trees  are  as  big  as  if  half  a  dozen  years 
had  passed  over  their  leafy  heads.  As 
for  the  roses,  I  never  saw  anything  like 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


the  way  they  flourish  at  their  own  sweet 
will.  Scarcely  a  leaf  is  to  be  seen  on 
the  ugly  straggling  tree  —  nothing  but 
masses  of  roses  of  every  tint  and  kind 
and  old-fashioned  variety.  The  utmost 
I  can  do  in  the  way  of  gathering  daily 
basketsful  appears  only  in  the  light  of 
judicious  pruning,  and  next  day  a  dozen 
blossoms  have  burst  forth  to  supply  the 
place  of  each  theft  of  mine.  And  there 
is  such  a  variety  of  trees !  Oaks  and 
bamboos,  blue  gums  and  deodars,  seem 
to  flourish  equally  well  within  a  yard  or 
two  of  each  other,  and  the  more  distant 
flower-beds  are  rilled  with  an  odd  mix- 
ture of  dahlias  and  daturas,  white  fleur- 
de-lis  and  bushy  geraniums,  scarlet  eu- 
phorbias and  verbenas.  But  the  weeds  ! 
They  are  a  chronic  eyesore  and  grief  to 
every  gardener.  On  path  and  grass-plat, 
flower-bed  and  border,  they  flaunt  and 
flourish.  "  Jack,"  the  Zulu  refugee,  wages 
a  feeble  and  totally  inadequate  warfare 
against  them  with  a  crooked  hoe,  but  he 
is  only  a  quarter  in  earnest,  and  stops  to 
groan  and  take  snuff  so  often  that  the 
result  is  that  our  garden  is  precisely  in 
the  condition  of  the  garden  of  the  slug- 
gard, gate  and  all.  This  hingeless  con- 
dition of  the  gate,  however,  is,  I  must  in 
fairness  state,  neither  Jack's  nor  our  fault. 
It  is  a  new  gate,  but  no  one  will  come 
out  from  the  town  to  hang  it.  That  is 
my  standing  grievance.  Because  we 
live  about  a  mile  from  the  town  it  is 
next  to  impossible  to  get  anything  done. 
The  town  itself  is  one  of  the  shabbiest  as- 
semblages of  dwellings  I  have  ever  seen 
in  a  colony.  It  is  not  to  be  named  on 
the  same  day  with  Christchurch,  the  cap- 
ital of  Canterbury,  New  Zealand,  which 
ten  years  ago  was  decently  paved  and 
well  lighted  by  gas.  Poor  sleepy  Maritz- 
burg  consists  now,  at  more  than  forty 
years  of  age  (Christchurch  is  not  twenty- 
five  yet),  of  a  few  straight,  wide,  grass- 
grown  streets,  which  are  only  picturesque 
at  a  little  distance  on  account  of  their 
having  trees  on  each  side.  On  particu- 
larly dark  nights  a  dozen  oil-lamps  stand- 
ing at  long  intervals  apart  are  lighted,  but 
when  it  is  even  moderately  starlight  these 
aids  to  finding  one's  way  about  are  pru- 
dently dispensed  with.  There  is  not  a 


single  handsome  and  hardly  a  decent 
building  in  the  whole  place.  The  streets, 
as  I  saw  them  after  rain,  are  veritable 
sloughs  of  despond,  but  they  are  capa- 
ble of  being  changed  by  dry  weather 
into  deserts  of  dust.  It  is  true,  I  have 
only  been  as  yet  twice  down  to  the  town, 
but  on  both  visits  it  reminded  me  more 
of  the  sleepy  villages  in  Washington 
Irving's  stories  than  of  a  smart,  mod- 
ern, go-ahead  colonial  "city."  There 
are  some  fairly  good  shops,  but  they 
make  no  show  outside,  and  within  the 
prices  of  most  of  the  articles  sold  are 
nearly  double  the  same  things  would 
bring  either  at  Melbourne  or  at  Christ- 
church.  As  D 'Urban  is  barely  a  month 
away  from  London  in  point  of  communi- 
cation, and  New  Zealand  (when  I  knew 
it)  nearly  treble  the  distance  and  time, 
this  is  a  great  puzzle  to  me. 

A  certain  air  of  quaint  interest  and  life 
is  given  to  the  otherwise  desolate  streets 
by  the  groups  of  Kafirs  and  the  teams 
of  wagons  which  bring  fuel  and  forage 
into  the  town  every  day.  Twenty  bul- 
locks drag  these  ponderous  contrivances 
— bullocks  so  lean  that  one  wonders  how 
they  have  strength  to  carry  their  wide- 
spreading  horns  aloft ;  bullocks  of  a  stu- 
pidity and  obstinacy  unparalleled  in  the 
natural  history  of  horned  beasts.  At 
their  head  walks  a  Kafir  lad  called  a 
"forelooper,"  who  tugs  at  a  rope  fasten- 
ed to  the  horns  of  the  leading  oxen,  and 
in  moments  of  general  confusion  invari- 
ably seems  to  pull  the  wrong  string  and 
get  the  whole  team  into  an  inextricable 
tangle  of  horns  and  yokes.  Sometimes 
of  a  quiet  Sunday  morning  these  teams 
and  wagons  I  see  "out-spanned"  on  the 
green  slopes  around  Maritzburg,  making 
a  picturesque  addition  to  the  sylvan  sce- 
nery. Near  each  wagon  a  light  wreath 
of  smoke  steals  up  into  the  summer 
air,  marking  where  some  preparation  of 
"mealies"  is  on  foot,  and  the  groups  of 
grazing  oxen — "spans,"  as  each  team  is 
called  —  give  the  animation  of  animal 
life  which  I  miss  so  sadly  at  every  turn 
in  this  part  of  the  world. 

In  Maritzburg  itself  I  only  noticed  two 
buildings  which  made  the  least  effect. 
One  is  the  government  house,  standing 


26 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


in  a  nice  garden  and  boasting  of  a  rath- 
er pretty  porch,  but  otherwise  reminding 
one  —  except  for  the  sentinel  on  duty — 
of  a  quiet  country  rectory  :  the  other  is  a 
small  block  comprising  the  public  offices. 
The  original  idea  of  this  square  building 
must  have  come  from  a  model  dairy. 
But  the  crowning  absurdity  of  the  place 
is  the  office  of  the  colonial  secretary, 
which  stands  nearly  opposite.  I  am  told 
that  inside  it  is  tolerably  comfortable,  be- 
ing the  remains  of  an  old  Dutch  build- 
ing :  outside,  it  can  only  be  compared  to 
a  dilapidated  barn  on  a  bankrupt  farm, 
and  when  it  was  first  pointed  out  to  me 
I  had  great  difficulty,  remembering  sim- 
ilar buildings  in  other  colonies,  in  be- 
lieving it  was  a  public  office. 

The  native  police  look  very  smart  and 
shiny  in  their  white  suits,  and  must  be 
objects  of  envy  to  their  black  brethren 
on  account  of  their  "knobkerries,"  the 
knobbed  sticks  which  they  alone  are  per- 
mitted to  carry  officially  in  their  hands. 
The  native  loves  a  stick,  and  as  he  is 
forbidden  to  carry  either  an  assegai — 
which  is  a  very  formidable  weapon  in- 
deed —  or  even  a  knobkerry,  only  one 
degree  less  dangerous,  he  consoles  him- 
self with  a  wand  or  switch  in  case  of 
coming  across  a  snake.  You  never  see 
a  Kafir  without  something  of  the  sort  in 
his  hand:  if  he  is  not  twirling  a  light 
stick,  then  he  has  a  sort  of  rude  reed 
pipe  from  which  he  extracts  sharp  and 
tuneless  sounds.  As  a  race,  the  Kafirs 
make  the  effect  of  possessing  a  fine 
physique  :  they  walk  with  an  erect  bear- 
ing and  a  light  step,  but  in  true  leisurely 
savage  fashion.  I  have  seen  the  black 
race  in  four  different  quarters  of  the 
globe,  and  I  never  saw  one  single  indi- 
vidual move  quickly  of  his  own  free  will. 
We  must  bear  in  mind,  however,  that  it 
is  a  new  and  altogether  revolutionary 
idea  to  a  Kafir  that  he  should  do  any 
work  at  all.  Work  is  for  women — war 
or  idleness  for  men  ;  consequently,  their 
fixed  idea  is  to  do  as  little  as  they  can ; 
and  no  Kafir  will  work  after  he  has  earn- 
ed money  enough  to  buy  a  sufficient 
number  of  wives  who  will  work  for  him. 
"Charlie,"  our  groom  —  who  is,  by  the 
way,  a  very  fine  gentleman  and  speaks 


"Ingeliss"  after  a  strange  fashion  of  his 
own — only  condescends  to  work  until  he 
can  purchase  a  wife.  Unfortunately,  the 
damsel  whom  he  prefers  is  a  costly  ar- 
ticle, and  her  parents  demand  a  cow,  a 
kettle  and  a  native  hut  as  the  price  of 
her  hand — or  hands,  rather — so  Charlie 
grunts  and  groans  through  about  as  much 
daily  work  as  an  English  boy  of  twelve 
years  old  could  manage  easily.  He  is  a 
very  amusing  character,  being  exceed- 
ingly proud,  and  will  only  obey  his  own 
master,  whom  he  calls  his  great  inkosi 
or  chief.  He  is  always  lamenting  the 
advent  of  the  inkosi-casa,  or  chieftainess, 
and  the  piccaninnies  and  their  following, 
especially  the  "vaiter,"  whom  he  detests. 
In  his  way,  Charlie  is  a  wag,  and  it  is  as 
good  as  a  play  to  see  his  pretence  of  stu- 
pidity when  the  "  vaiter"  or  French  butler 
desires  him  to  go  and  eat  "sa  paniche." 
Charlie  understands  perfectly  that  he  is 
told  to  go  and  get  his  breakfast  of  mealy 
porridge,  but  he  won't  admit  that  it  is  to 
be  called  "paniche,"  preferring  his  own 
word  "  scoff;"  so  he  shakes  his  head  vio- 
lently and  says,  "Nay,  nay,  paniche." 
Then,  with  many  nods,  "Scoff,  ja;"  and 
so  in  this  strange  gibberish  of  three  lan- 
guages he  and  the  Frenchman  carry  on 
quite  a  pretty  quarrel.  Charlie  also 
"mocks  himself"  of  the  other  servants, 
I  am  informed,  and  asserts  that  he  is  the 
"  indema"  or  headman.  He  freely  boxes 
the  ears  of  Jack,  the  Zulu  refugee — poor 
Jack,  who  fled  from  his  own  country, 
next  door,  the  other  day,  and  arrived 
here  clad  in  only  a  short  flap  made  of 
three  bucks'  tails.  That  is  only  a  month 
ago,  and  "  Jack"  is  already  quite  a  petit 
m  ait  re  about  his  clothes.  He  ordinarily 
wears  a  suit  of  knickerbockers  and  a 
shirt  of  blue  check  bound  with  red,  and 
a  string  of  beads  round  his  neck,  but  he 
cries  like  a  baby  if  he  tears  his  clothes, 
or  still  worse  if  the  color  of  the  red  braid 
washes  out.  At  first  he  hated  civilized 
garments,  even  when  they  were  only  two 
in  number,  and  begged  to  be  allowed  to 
assume  a  sack  with  holes  for  the  arms, 
which  is  the  Kafir  compromise  when 
near  a  town  between  clothes  and  flaps 
made  of  the  tails  of  wild  beasts  or  strips 
of  hide.  But  he  soon  came  to  delight  in 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


27 


them,  and  is  now  always  begging  for 
"something  to  wear." 

I  confess  I  am  sorry  for  Jack.  He  is 
the  kitchen-boy,  and  is  learning  with 
much  pains  and  difficulty  the  wrong 
language.  My  cook  is  also  French, 
and,  naturally,  all  that  Jack  learns  is 
French,  and  not  English.  Imagine  poor 
Jack's  dismay  when,  after  his  three  years' 
apprenticeship  to  us  is  ended,  he  seeks 
perhaps  to  better  himself,  and  finds  that 
no  one  except  madame  can  understand 
him !  Most  of  their  dialogues  are  car- 
ried on  by  pantomime  and  the  incessant 
use,  in  differing  tones  of  voice,  of  the 
word  "  Ja."  Jack  is  a  big,  loutish  young 
man,  but  very  ugly  and  feeble,  and  ap- 
parently under  the  impression  that  he  is 
perpetually  "  wanted"  to  answer  for  the 
little  indiscretion,  whatever  it  was,  on 
account  of  which  he  was  forced  to  flee 
over  the  border.  He  is  timid  and  scared 
to  the  last  degree,  and  abjectly  anxious 
to  please  if  it  does  not  entail  too  much 
exertion.  He  is,  as  it  were,  apprenticed 
to  us  for  three  years.  We  are  bound  to 
feed  and  clothe  and  doctor  him,  and  he 
is  to  work  for  us,  in  his  own  lazy  fash- 
ion, for  small  wages.  The  first  time  Jack 
broke  a  plate  his  terror  and  despair  were 
quite  edifying  to  behold.  Madame  call- 
ed him  a  "  maladroit"  on  the  spot.  Jack 
learned  this  word,  and  after  his  work  was 
over  seated  himself  gravely  on  the  ground 
with  the  fragments  of  the  plate,  which  he 
tried  to  join  together,  but  gave  up  the 
attempt  at  last,  announcing  in  his  own 
tongue  that  it  was  "dead."  After  a  lit- 
tle consideration  he  said  slowly,  several 
times,  "  Maldraw,  ja,"  and  hit  himself  a 
good  thump  at  each  "ja."  Now,  I  grieve 
to  say,  Jack  breaks  plates,  dishes  and 
cups  with  a  perfectly  easy  and  unembar- 
rassed qonscience,  and  is  already  far  too 
civilized  to  care  in  the  least  for  his  mis- 
fortunes in  that  line.  Whenever  a  fowl 
is  killed — and  I  came  upon  Jack  slowly 
putting  one  to  death  the  other  day  with 
a  pair  of  nail-scissors — he  possesses  him- 
self of  a  small  store  of  feathers,  which  he 
wears  tastefully  placed  over  his  left  ear. 
A  gay  ribbon,  worn  like  a  bandeau  across 
the  forehead,  is  what  he  really  loves. 
Jack  is  very  proud  of  a  tawdry  ribbon  of 


many  colors  with  a  golden  ground  which 
I  found  for  him  the  other  day,  only  he 
never  can  make  up  his  mind  where  to 
wear  it ;  and  I  often  come  upon  him  sit- 
ting in  the  shade  with  the  ribbon  in  his 
hands,  gravely  considering  the  question. 
The  Pickle  and  plague  of  the  estab- 
lishment, however,  is  the  boy  Tom,  a 
grinning  young  savage  fresh  from  his 
kraal,  up  to  any  amount  of  mischief, 
who  in  an  evil  hour  has  been  engaged 
as  the  baby's  body-servant.  I  cannot 
trust  him  with  the  child  out  of  my  sight 
for  a  moment,  for  he  "  snuffs  "  enormous- 
ly, and  smokes  coarse  tobacco  out  of  a 
cow's  horn,  and  is  anxious  to  teach  the 
baby  both  these  accomplishments.  Tom 
wears  his  snuff-box — which  is  a  brass 
cylinder  a  couple  of  inches  long — in 
either  ear  impartially,  there  being  huge 
slits  in  the  cartilage  for  the  purpose,  and 
the  baby  never  rests  till  he  gets  posses- 
sion of  it  and  sneezes  himself  nearly  into 
fits.  Tom  likes  nursing  Baby  immensely, 
and  croons  to  him  in  a  strange  buzzing 
way  which  lulls  him  to  sleep  invariably. 
He  is  very  anxious,  however,  to  acquire 
some  words  of  English,  and  I  was  much 
startled  the  other  day  to  hear  in  the  ve- 
randah my  own  voice  saying,  "  What  is 
it,  dear?"  over  and  over  again.  This 
phrase  proceeded  from  Tom,  who  kept 
on  repeating  it,  parrot-fashion — an  exact 
imitation,  but  with  no  idea  of  its  mean- 
ing. I  had  heard  the  baby  whimpering  a 
little  time  before,  and  Tom  had  remark- 
ed that  these  four  words  produced  the 
happiest  effect  in  restoring  good-humor ; 
so  he  learned  them,  accent  and  all,  on 
the  spot,  and  used  them  as  a  spell  or 
charm  on  the  next  opportunity.  I  think 
even  the  poor  baby  was  puzzled.  But 
one  cannot  feel  sure  of  what  Tom  will 
do  next.  A  few  evenings  ago  I  trusted 
him  to  wheel  the  perambulator  about 
the  garden-paths,  but,  becoming  anxious 
in  a  very  few  minutes  to  know  what  he 
was  about,  I  went  to  look  for  him.  I 
found  him  grinning  in  high  glee,  watch- 
ing the  baby's  efforts  at  cutting  his  teeth 
on  a  live  young  bird.  Master  Tom  had 
spied  a  nest,  climbed  the  tree,  and 
brought  down  the  poor  little  bird,  which 
he  presented  to  the  child,  who  instantly 


28 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


put  it  into  his  mouth.  When  I  arrived  on 
the  scene  Baby's  mouth  was  full  of  feath- 
ers, over  which  he  was  making  a  very 
disgusted  face,  and  the  unhappy  bird  was 
nearly  dead  of  fright  and  squeezing,  whilst 
Tom  was  in  such  convulsions  of  laughter 
that  I  nearly  boxed  his  ears.  He  show- 
ed me  by  signs  how  Baby  insisted  on 
sucking  the  bird's  head,  and  conveyed 
his  intense  amusement  at  the  idea.  I 
made  Master  Tom  climb  the  tree  instant- 
ly and  put  the  poor  little  half- dead  crea- 
ture back  into  its  nest,  and  sent  for 
Charlie  to  explain  to  him  he  should  have 
no  sugar — the  only  punishment  Tom 
cares  about — for  two  days.  I  often  think, 
however,  that  I  must  try  and  find  anoth- 
er penalty,  for  when  Tom's  allowance  of 
sugar  is  stopped  he  "requisitions"  that 
of  every  one  else,  and  so  gets  rather  more 
than  usual.  He  is  immensely  proud  of 
the  brass  chin-strap  of  an  old  artillery 
bushy  which  has  been  given  to  him.  He 
used  to  wear  it  across  his  forehead  in  the 
favorite  Kafir  fashion,  but  as  the  baby 
always  made  it  his  first  business  to  pull 
this  shining  strap  down  over  Tom's  eyes, 
and  eventually  over  Tom's  mouth,  it  has 
been  transferred  to  his  neck. 

These  Kafir-lads  make  excellent  nurse- 
boys  generally,  and  English  children  are 
very  fond  of  them.  Nurse-girls  are  rare, 
as  the  Kafir  women  begin  their  lives  of 
toil  so  early  that  they  are  never  very 
handy  or  gentle  in  a  house,  and  boys  are 
easier  to  train  as  servants.  I  heard  to- 
day, however,  of  an  excellent  Kafir  nurse- 
maid who  was  the  daughter  of  a  chief, 
and  whose  only  drawback  was  the  size 
of  her  family.  She  was  actually  and 
truly  one  of  eighty  brothers  and  sisters, 
her  father  being  a  rich  man  with  twenty- 
five  wives.  That  simply  means  that  he 
had  twenty  -  five  devoted  slaves,  who 
worked  morning,  noon  and  night  for 
him  in  field  and  mealy-patch  without 
wages.  Jack  the  Zulu  wanted  to  be 
nurse-boy  dreadfully,  and  used  to  follow 
Nurse  about  with  a  towel  rolled  up  into 
a  bundle,  and  another  towel  arranged  as 
drapery,  dandling  an  imaginary  baby  on 
his  arm,  saying  plaintively,  "  Piccaninny, 
piccaninny  !"  This  Nurse  translated  to 
mean  that  he  was  an  experienced  nurse- 


boy,  and  had  taken  care  of  a  baby  in  his 
own  country,  but  as  I  had  no  confidence 
in  maladroit  Jack,  who  chanced  to  be 
very  deaf  besides,  he  was  ruthlessly 
relegated  to  his  pots  and  pans. 

It  is  very  curious  to  see  the  cast-off 
clothes  of  all  the  armies  of  Europe  find- 
ing their  way  hither.  The  natives  of 
South  Africa  prefer  an  old  uniform  coat 
or  tunic  to  any  other  covering,  and  the 
effect  of  a  short  scarlet  garment  when 
worn  with  bare  legs  is  irresistibly  droll. 
The  apparently  inexhaustible  supply  of 
old-fashioned  English  coatees  with  their 
worsted  epaulettes  is  just  coming  to  an 
end,  and  being  succeeded  by  ragged  red 
tunics,  franc-tireurs'  brownish-green  jack- 
ets and  much-worn  Prussian  gray  coats. 
Kafir-Land  may  be  looked  upon  as  the 
old-clothes  shop  of  all  the  fighting  world, 
for  sooner  or  later  every  cast-off  scrap 
of  soldier's  clothing  drifts  toward  it. 
Charlie  prides  himself  much  upon  the 
possession  of  an  old  gray  great-coat,  so 
patched  and  faded  that  it  may  well  have 
been  one  of  those  which  toiled  up  the 
slopes  of  Inkerman  that  rainy  Sunday 
morning  twenty  years  ago  ;  whilst  scamp- 
ish Tom  got  well  chaffed  the  other  day 
for  suddenly  making  his  appearance  clad 
in  a  stained  red  tunic  with  buff  collar 
and  cuffs,  and  the  number  of  the  old 
"dirty  Half-hundred"  in  tarnished  metal 
on  the  shoulder-scales.  "Sir  Garnet," 
cried  Charlie  the  witty,  whilst  Jack  affect- 
ed to  prostrate  himself  before  the  grin- 
ning imp,  exclaiming,  "O  great  inkosi !" 

Charlie  is  angry  with  me  just  now,  and 
looks  most  reproachfully  my  way  on  all 
occasions.  The  cause  is  that  he  was 
sweeping  away  sundry  huge  spiders' 
webs  from  the  roof  of  the  verandah  (the 
work  of  a  single  night)  when  I  heard 
him  coughing  frightfully.  I  gave  him 
some  lozenges,  saying,  "  Do  your  cough 
good,  Charlie."  Charlie  received  them 
in  both  hands  held  like  a  cup,  the  high- 
est form  of  Kafir  gratitude,  and  gulped 
them  all  down  on  the  spot.  Next  day 
I  heard  the  same  dreadful  cough,  and 
told  F to  give  him  some  more  loz- 
enges. But  Charlie  would  have  none 
of  them,  alleging  he  "eats  plenty  to- 
morrow's yesterday,  and  dey  no  good 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


29 


at  all;"  and  he  evidently  despises  me  ! 
and  my  remedies. 

If  only  there  were  no  hot  winds  !  But 
the  constant  changes  are  so  trying  and 
so  sudden.  Sometimes  we  have  a  hot, 
scorching  gale  all  day,  drying  and  parch- 
ing one's  very  skin  up,  and  shriveling 
one's  lovely  roses  like  the  blast  from  a 
furnace:  then  in  the  afternoon  a  dark 
cloud  sails  suddenly  up  from  behind  the 
hills  to  the  west.  It  is  over  the  house 
before  one  knows  it  is  coming:  a  loud 
clap  of  thunder  shakes  the  very  ground 
beneath  one's  feet,  others  follow  rapid- 
ly, and  a  thunderstorm  bewilders  one  for 
some  ten  minutes  or  so.  A  few  drops 
of  cold  rain  fall  to  the  sound  of  the  dis- 
tant thunder,  now  rolling  away  eastward, 
which  yet  "struggles  and  howls  at  fits." 
It  is  not  always  distant,  but  we  have  not 
yet  seen  a  real  thunderstorm ;  only  a  few 
of  these  short,  sudden  electrical  disturb- 
ances, which  come  and  go  more  like  ex- 
plosions than  anything  else.  A  few  days 
ago  there  was  a  duststorm  which  had  a 
very  curious  effect  as  we  looked  down 
upon  it  from  this  hill.  All  along  the 
roads  one  could  watch  the  dust  being 
caught  up,  as  it  were,  and  whirled  along 
in  dense  clouds,  whilst  the  poor  little 
town  itself  was  absolutely  blotted  out  by 
the  blinding  masses  of  fine  powder.  For 
half  an  hour  or  so  we  could  afford  to  watch 
and  smile  at  our  neighbors'  plight,  but 
soon  we  had  to  flee  for  shelter  ourselves 
within  the  house,  for  a  furious  hot  gale 
drove  heavily  up  behind  the  dust  and 
nearly  blew  us  away  altogether.  Still, 
there  was  no  thunderstorm,  though  we 
quite  wished  for  one  to  cool  the  air  and 
refresh  the  parched  and  burnt-up  grass 
and  flowers.  Such  afternoons  are  gen- 
erally pretty  sure  to  be  succeeded  by  a 
cold  night,  and  perhaps  a  cold,  damp 
morning;  and  one  can  already  under- 
stand that  these  alternations  during  the 
summer  months  are  apt  to  produce  dys- 
entery among  young  children.  I  hear 
just  now  of  a  good  many  such  ca^es 
among  babies. 

I  have  been  so  exceedingly  busy  this 
month  packing,  arranging  and  settling 
that  there  has  been  but  little  time  for 
going  about  and  seeing  the  rather  pretty 


environs  of  Maritzburg;  besides  which, 
the  weather  is  dead  against  excursions, 
changing  as  it  does  to  rain  or  threaten- 
ing thunderstorms  nearly  every  after- 
noon. One  evening  we  ventured  out  for 
a  walk  in  spite  of  growlings  and  spittings 
up  above  among  the  crass-looking  clouds. 
Natal  is  not  a  nice  country,  for  women 
at  all  events,  to  walk  in.  You  have  to 
keep  religiously  to  the  road  or  track,  for 
woe  betide  the  rash  person  who  ventures 
on  the  grass,  though  from  repeated  burn- 
ings all  about  these  hills  it  is  quite  short. 
There  is  a  risk  of  your  treading  on  a 
snake,  and  a  certainty  of  your  treading 
on  a  frog.  You  will  soon  find  your  legs 
covered  with  small  and  pertinacious  ticks, 
who  have  apparently  taken  a  "header" 
into  your  flesh  and  made  up  their  minds 
to  die  sooner  than  let  go.  They  must  be 
the  bull -dogs  of  the  insect  tribe,  these 
ticks,  for  a  sharp  needle  will  scarcely 
dislodge  them.  At  the  last  extremity  of 
extraction  they  only  burrow  their  heads 
deeper  into  the  skin,  and  will  lose  this 
important  part  of  their  tiny  bodies  soon- 
er than  yield  to  the  gentlest  leverage. 
Then  there  are  myriads  of  burs  which 
cling  to  you  in  green  and  brown  scales 
of  roughness,  and  fringe  your  petticoats 
with  their  sticky  little  lumps.  As  for  the 
poor  petticoats  themselves,  however  short 
you  may  kilt  them,  you  bring  them  back 
from  a  walk  deeply  flounced  with  the  red 
clay  of  the  roads  ;  and  as  the  people  who 
wash  do  not  seem  to  consider  this  a  dis- 
advantage, and  take  but  little  pains  to 
remove  the  earth-stains,  one's  garments 
gradually  acquire,  even  when  clean,  a 
uniform  bordering  of  dingy  red.  All 
the  water  at  this  time  of  year  is  red  too; 
as  the  rivers  are  stirred  up  by  the  heavy 
summer  rains,  and  resemble  angry  mud- 
dy ditches  more  than  fresh-water  streams. 
I  miss  at  every  turn  the  abundance  of 
clear,  clean,  sparkling  water  in  the  creeks 
and  rivers  of  my  dear  New  Zealand,  and 
it  is  only  after  heavy  rain,  when  every 
bath  and  large  vessel  has  been  turned 
into  a  receptacle  during  the  downpour, 
that  one  can  compass  the  luxury  of  an 
inviting-looking  bath  or  glass  of  drink- 
ing-water. Of  course  this  turbid  water 
renders  it  pretty  difficult  to  get  one's 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


clothes  properly  washed,  and  the  substi- 
tute for  a  mangle  is  an  active  Kafir,  who 
makes  the  roughly-dried  clothes  up  into 
a  neat  parcel,  places  them  on  a  stone 
and  dances  up  and  down  upon  them  for 
as  long  or  short  a  time  as  he  pleases. 
Fuel  is  so  enormously  dear  that  the  cost 
of  having  clothes  ironed  is  something 
astounding,  and  altogether  washing  is 
one  of  the  many  costly  items  of  Natal- 
ian  housekeeping.  When  I  remember 
the  frantic  state  of  indignation  and  alarm 
we  were  all  in  in  England  three  years 
ago  when  coals  rose  to  £2  los.  a  ton, 
and  think  how  cheap  I  should  consider 
that  price  for  fuel  here,  I  can't  help  a 
melancholy  smile.  Nine  solid  sovereigns 
purchase  you  a  tolerable-sized  load  of 
wood,  about  equal  for  cooking  purposes 
to  a  ton  of  coal ;  but  whereas  the  coal  is 
at  all  events  some  comfort  and  conveni- 
ence to  use,  the  wood  is  only  a  source 
of  additional  trouble  and  expense.  It 
has  to  be  cut  up  and  dried,  and  finally 
coaxed  and  cajoled  by  incessant  use  of 
the  bellows  into  burning.  Besides  the 
price  of  fuel,  provisions  of  all  sorts  seem 
to  me  to  be  dear  and  bad.  Milk  is  sold 
by  the  quart  bottle  :  it  is  now  fourpence 
per  bottle,  but  rises  to  sixpence  during 
the  winter.  Meat  is  eightpence  a  pound, 
but  it  is  so  thin  and  bony,  and  of  such 
indifferent  quality,  that  there  is  very  little 
saving  in  that  respect.  I  have  not  tasted 
any  really  good  butter  since  we  arrived, 
and  we  pay  two  shillings  a  pound  for 
cheesy,  rancid  stuff.  I  hear  that  "  meal- 
ies," the  crushed  maize,  are  also  very 
dear,  and  so  is  forage  for  the  horses.  In- 
stead of  the  horses  being  left  out  on  the 
run  night  and  day,  summer  and  winter, 
as  they  used  to  be  in  New  Zealand,  with 
an  occasional  feed  of  oats  for  a  treat,  they 
need  to  be  carefully  housed  at  night  and 
well  fed  with  oaten  straw  and  mealies  to 
give  them  a  chance  against  the  mysterious 
and  fatal  "horse-sickness,"  which  kills 
them  in  a  few  hours.  Altogether,  so  far 
as  my  very  limited  experience — of  only 
a  few  weeks,  remember — goes,  I  should 
say  that  Natal  was  an  expensive  place  to 
live  in,  owing  to  the  scarcity  and  dear- 
ness  of  the  necessaries  of  life.  I  am 
told  that  far  up  in  the  country  food  and 


fuel  are  cheap  and  good,  and  that  it  is 
the  dearness  and  difficulty  of  transport 
which  forces  Maritzburg  to  depend  foi 
its  supplies  entirely  on  what  is  grown  in 
its  own  immediate  vicinity,  where  there 
is  not  very  much  land  under  cultivation  ; 
so  we  must  look  to  the  coming  railway 
to  remedy  all  that. 

If  only  one  could  eat  flowers,  or  if  wheat 
and  other  cereals  grew  as  freely  and  lux- 
uriously as  flowers  grow,  how  nice  it  would 
be!  On  the  open  grassy  downs  about 
here  the  blossoms  are  lovely  —  beautiful 
lilies  in  scarlet  and  white  clusters,  sev- 
eral sorts  of  periwinkles,  heaths,  cinne- 
rarias,  both  purple  and  white,  and  gold- 
en bushes  of  citisus  or  Cape  broom,  load 
the  air  with  fragrance.  By  the  side  of 
every  "spruit"  or  brook  one  sees  clumps 
of  tall  arum  lilies  filling  every  little  wa- 
ter-washed hollow  in  the  brook,  and  the 
ferns  which  make  each  ditch  and  water- 
course green  and  plumy  have  a  sepa- 
rate shady  beauty  of  their  own.  This  is 
all  in  Nature's  own  free,  open  garden, 
and  when  the  least  cultivation  or  care 
is  added  to  her  bounteous  luxuriance  a 
magnificent  garden  for  fruit,  vegetables 
and  flowers  is  the  result ;  always  suppos- 
ing you  are  fortunate  enough  to  be  able 
to  induce  these  lazy  Kafirs  to  dig  the 
ground  for  you. 

About  a  fortnight  ago  I  braved  the  dirt 
and  disagreeables  of  a  cross-country  walk 
in  showery  weather — for  we  have  not  been 
able  to  meet  with  a  horse  to  suit  us  yet — 
and  went  to  see  a  beautiful  garden  a  cou- 
ple of  miles  away.  It  was  approached 
by  a  long  double  avenue  of  blue  gum 
trees,  planted  only  nine  years  ago,  but 
tall  and  stately  as  though  a  century  had 
passed  over  their  lofty,  pointed  heads, 
and  with  a  broad  red  clay  road  running 
between  the  parallel  lines  of  trees.  The 
ordinary  practice  of  clearing  away  the 
grass  as  much  as  possible  round  a  house 
strikes  an  English  eye  as  bare  and  odd, 
but  when  one  hears  that  it  is  done  to 
avoid  snakes,  it  becomes  a  necessary 
and  harmonious  adjunct  to  the  rest  of 
the  scene.  In  this  instance  I  found  these 
broad  smooth  walks,  with  their  deep  rich 
red  color,  a  very  beautiful  contrast  to  the 
glow  of  brilliant  blossoms  in  the  enor- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


mous  flower-beds.  For  this  garden  was 
not  at  all  like  an  ordinary  garden,  still 
less  like  a  prim  English  parterre.  The 
beds  were  as  large  as  small  fields,  slight- 
ly raised  and  bordered  by  a  thick  line  of 
violets.  Large  shrubs  of  beautiful  semi- 
tropical  plants  made  tangled  heaps  of 
purple,  scarlet  and  white  blossoms  on 
every  side  ;  the  large  creamy  bells  of  the 
datura  drooped  toward  the  reddish  earth  ; 
thorny  shrubs  of  that  odd  bluish-green 
peculiar  to  Australian  foliage  grew  side 
by  side  with  the  sombre-leaved  myrtle. 
Every  plant  grew  in  the  most  liberal 
fashion  ;  green  things  which  we  are  ac- 
customed to  see  in  England  in  small 
pots  shoot  up  here  to  the  height  of  lau- 
rel bushes ;  a  screen  of  scarlet  euphor- 
bia made  a  brilliant  line  against  a  back- 
ground formed  by  a  hedge  of  shell-like 
cluster-roses,  and  each  pillar  of  the  ve- 
randah of  the  little  house  had  its  own 
magnificent  creeper.  Up  one  standard 
an  ipomea  twined  closely ;  another  pil- 
lar was  hidden  by  the  luxuriance  of  a 
trumpet-honeysuckle ;  whilst  a  third  was 
thickly  covered  by  an  immense  passion- 
flower. In  shady,  damp  places  grew 
many  varieties  of  ferns  and  blue  hy- 
drangeas, whilst  other  beds  were  filled 
by  gay  patches  of  verbenas  of  every  hue 
and  shade.  The  sweet-scented  verbena 
is  one  of  the  commonest  and  most  suc- 
cessful shrubs  in  a  Natal  garden,  and 
just  now  the  large  bushes  of  it  which  one 
sees  in  every  direction  are  covered  by  ta- 
pering spikes  of  its  tiny  white  blossoms. 
But  the  feature  of  this  garden  was  roses 
— roses  on  each  side  whichever  way  you 
turned,  and  I  should  think  of  at  least  a 
hundred  different  sorts.  Not  the  stiff 
standard  rose  tree  of  an  English  garden, 
with  its  few  precious  blossoms,  to  be 
looked  at  from  a  distance  and  admired 
with  respectful  gravity.  No :  in  this  gar- 
den the  roses  grow  as  they  might  have 
grown  in  Eden — untrained,  unpruned,  in 
enormous  bushes  covered  entirely  by 
magnificent  blossoms,  each  bloom  of 
which  would  have  won  a  prize  at  a  rose- 
show.  There  was  one  cloth-of-gold  rose 
bush  that  I  shall  never  forget  —  its  size, 
its  fragrance,  its  wealth  of  creamy-yel- 
lowish blossoms.  A  few  yards  off  stood 


a  still  bigger  and  more  luxuriant  pyra- 
mid, some  ten  feet  high,  covered  with  the 
large,  delicate  and  regular  pink  bloom 
of  the  souvenir  de  Malmaison.  When  I 
talk  of  a  bush  I  only  mean  one  especial 
bush  which  caught  my  eye.  I  suppose 
there  were  fifty  cloth-of-gold  and  fifty 
souvenir  rose  bushes  in  that  garden. 
Red  roses,  white  roses,  tea  roses,  blush- 
roses,  moss  roses,  and,  last  not  least,  the 
dear  old-fashioned,  homely  cabbage  rose, 
sweetest  and  most  sturdy  of  all.  You 
could  wander  for  acres  and  acres  among 
fruit  trees  and  plantations  of  oaks  and 
willows  and  other  trees,  but  you  never 
got  away  from  the  roses.  There  they 
were,  beautiful,  delicious  things  at  every 
turn — hedges  of  them,  screens  of  them 
and  giant  bushes  of  them  on  either  hand. 
As  I  have  said  before,  though  kept  free 
from  weeds  by  some  half  dozen  scantily- 
clad  but  stalwart  Kafirs  with  their  awk- 
ward hoes,  it  was  not  a  bit  like  a  trim 
English  garden.  It  was  like  a  garden 
in  which  Lalla  Rookh  might  have  wan- 
dered by  moonlight  talking  sentimental 
philosophy  with  her  minstrel  prince  un- 
der old  Fadladeen's  chaperonage,  or  a 
garden  that  Boccaccio  might  have  peo- 
pled with  his  Arcadian  fine  ladies  and 
gentlemen.  It  was  emphatically  a  poet's 
or  a  painter's  garden,  not  a  gardener's 
garden.  Then,  as  though  nothing  should 
be  wanting  to  make  the  scene  lovely,  one 
could  hear  through  the  fragrant  silence 
the  tinkling  of  the  little  "spruit"  or  brook 
at  the  bottom  of  the  garden,  and  the 
sweet  song  of  the  Cape  canary,  the  same 
sort  of  greenish  finch  which  is  the  parent 
stock  of  all  our  canaries,  and  whose  ac- 
quaintance I  first  made  in  Madeira.  A 
very  sweet  warbler  it  is,  and  the  clear, 
flute-like  notes  sounded  prettily  among 
the  roses.  From  blossom  to  blossom 
lovely  butterflies  flitted,  perching  quite 
fearlessly  on  the  red  clay  walk  just  be- 
fore me,  folding  and  unfolding  their  big 
painted  wings.  Every  day  I  see  a  new 
kind  of  butterfly,  and  the  moths  which 
one  comes  upon  hidden  away  under  the 
leaves  of  the  creepers  during  the  bright 
noisy  day  are  lovely  beyond  the  power 
of  words.  One  little  fellow  is  a  great 
pet  of  mine.  He  wears  pure  white  wings, 


32 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


with  vermilion  stripes  drawn  in  regular 
horizontal  lines  across  his  back,  and 
between  the  lines  are  shorter,  broken 
streaks  of  black,  which  is  at  once  neat 
and  uncommon  ;  but  he  is  always  in  the 
last  stage  of  sleepiness  when  I  see  him. 

I  am  so  glad  little  G is  not  old  enough 

to  want  to  catch  them  all  and  impale 
them  upon  corks  in  a  glass  case ;  so  the 
pretty  creatures  live  out  their  brief  and 
happy  life  in  the  sunshine,  without  let  or 
hinderance  from  him. 

The  subject  of  which  my  mind  is  most 
full  just  now  is  the  purchase  of  a  horse. 

F has  a  fairly  good  chestnut  cob  of 

his  own  ;  G has  become  possessed,  to 

his  intense  delight,  of  an  aged  and  long- 
suffering  Basuto  pony,  whom  he  fidgets 
to  death  during  the  day  by  driving  him 
all  over  the  place,  declaring  he  is  "only 
showing  him  where  the  nicest  grass 
grows  ;"  and  I  want  a  steed  to  draw  my 

pony-carriage  and  to  carry  me.     F 

and  I  are  at  dagger's  drawn  on  this  ques- 
tion. He  wants  to  buy  me  a  young, 
handsome,  showy  horse  of  whom  his  ad- 
mirers predict  that  "he  will  steady  down 
presently,"  whilst  my  affections  are  firm- 
ly fixed  on  an  aged  screw  who  would  not 
turn  his  head  if  an  Armstrong  gun  were 
fired  behind  him.  His  owner  says  Scots- 
man is  "rising  eleven  :"  F declares 

Scotsman  will  never  see  his  twentieth 

birthday  again.     F points  out  to  me 

that  Scotsman  has  had  rough  times  of 
it,  apparently,  in  his  distant  youth,  and 
that  he  is  strangely  battered  •  about  the 
head,  and  has  a  large  notch  out  of  one 
ear.  I  retaliate  by  reminding  him  how 
sagely  the  old  horse  picked  his  way,  with 
a  precision  of  judgment  which  only  years 
can  give,  through  the  morass  which  lies 
at  the  foot  of  the  hill,  and  which  must 
be  crossed  every  time  I  go  into  town  (and 
there  is  nowhere  else  to  go).  That  mo- 
rass is  a  bog  in  summer  and  a  honey- 
comb of  deep  ruts  and  holes  in  winter, 
which,  you  must  bear  in  mind,  is  the 
dry  season  here.  Besides  his  tact  in 
the  matter  of  the  morass,  did  I  not  drive 
Scotsman  the  other  day  to  the  park,  and 
did  he  not  comport  himself  in  the  most 
delightfully  sedate  fashion  ?  You  require 
experience  to  be  on  the  lookout  for  the 


perils  of  Maritzburg  streets,  it  seems,  for 
all  their  sleepy,  deserted,  tumble-down 
air.  First  of  all,  there  are  the  transport- 
wagons,  with  their  long  span  of  oxen 
straggling  all  across  the  road,  and  a 
nervous  bullock  precipitating  himself 
under  your  horse's  nose.  The  driver, 
too,  invariably  takes  the  opportunity  of 
a  lady  passing  him  to  crack  his  whip 
violently,  enough  to  startle  any  horse 
except  Scotsman.  Then  when  you  have 
passed  the  place  where  the  wagons  most 
do  congregate,  and  think  you  are  toler- 
ably safe  and  need  only  look  out  for  ruts 
and  holes  in  the  street,  lo  !  a  furious  gal- 
loping behind  you,  and  some  half  dozen 
of  the  "gilded  youth"  of  Maritzburg 
dash  past  you,  stop,  wheel  round  and 
gallop  past  again,  until  you  are  almost 
blinded  with  dust  or  smothered  with  mud, 
according  to  the  season.  This  peril  oc- 
curred several  times  during  my  drive 
to  and  from  the  park,  and  I  can  only 
remark  that  dear  old  Scotsman  kept 
his  temper  better  than  I  did:  perhaps 
he  was  more  accustomed  to  Maritzburg 
manners. 

When  the  park  was  reached  at  last, 
across  a  frail  and  uncertain  wooden 
bridge  shaded  by  large  weeping  willows, 
I  found  it  the  most  creditable  thing  I 
had  yet  seen.  It  is  admirably  laid  out, 
the  natural  undulations  of  the  ground 
being  made  the  most  of,  and  exceeding- 
ly well  kept.  This  in  itself  is  a  difficult 
matter  where  all  vegetation  runs  up  like 
Jack's  famous  beanstalk,  and  where  the 
old  proverb  about  the  steed  starving 
whilst  his  grass  is  growing  falls  com- 
pletely to  the  ground.  There  are  nu- 
merous drives,  made  level  by  a  coating 
of  smooth  black  shale,  and  bordered  by 
a  double  line  of  syringas  and  oaks,  with 
hedges  of  myrtle  or  pomegranate.  In 
some  places  the  roads  run  alongside  the 
little  river — a  very  muddy  torrent  when 
I  saw  it — and  then  the  oaks  give  way  to 
great  drooping  willows,  beneath  whose 
trailing  branches  the  river  swirled  an- 
grily. On  fine  Saturday  afternoons  the 
band  of  the  regiment  stationed  here 
plays  on  a  clear  space  under  some 
shady  trees — for  you  can  never  sit  or 
stand  on  the  grass  in  Natal,  and  even 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


33 


croquet  is  played  on  bare  leveled  earth 
— and  everybody  rides  or  walks  or  drives 
about.  When  I  saw  the  park  there  was 
not  a  living  creature  in  it,  for  it  was,  as 
most  of  our  summer  afternoons  are,  wet 
and  cold  and  drizzling  ;  but,  considering 
that  there  was  no  thunderstorm  likely  to 
break  over  our  heads  that  day,  I  felt  that 
I  could  afford  to  despise  a  silent  Scotch 
mist.  We  varied  our  afternoon  weather 
last  week  by  a  hailstorm,  of  which  the 
stones  were  as  big  as  large  marbles.  I 
was  scoffed  at  for  remarking  this,  and 
assured  it  was  "  nothing,  absolutely  noth- 
ing," to  the  great  hailstorm  of  two  years 
ago,  which  broke  nearly  every  tile  and 
pane  of  glass  in  Maritzburg,  and  left  the 
town  looking  precisely  as  though  it  had 
been  bombarded.  I  have  seen  photo- 
graphs of  some  of  the  ruined  houses, 
and  it  is  certainly  difficult  to  believe  that 
hail  could  have  done  so  much  mischief. 
Then,  again,  stories  reach  me  of  a  cer- 
tain thunderstorm  one  Sunday  evening 
just  before  I  arrived  in  which  the  light- 
ning struck  a  room  in  which  a  family 
was  assembled  at  evening  prayers,  kill- 
ing the  poor  old  father  with  the  Bible  in 
his  hand,  and  knocking  over  every  mem- 
ber of  the  little  congregation.  My  in- 
formant said,  "  I  assure  you  it  seemed  as 
though  the  lightning  were  poured  out 
of  heaven  in  a  jug.  There  were  no  dis- 
tinct flashes  :  the  heavens  appeared  to 
split  open  and  pour  down  a  flood  of 
blazing  violet  light."  I  have  seen  noth- 


ing like  this  yet,  but  can  quite  realize 
what  such  a  storm  must  be  like,  for  I 
have  observed  already  how  different  the 
color  of  the  lightning  is.  The  flashes  I 
have  seen  were  exactly  of  the  lilac  col- 
or he  described,  and  they  followed  each 
other  with  a  rapidity  of  succession  un- 
known in  less  electric  regions.  And  yet 
my  last  English  letters  were  full  of  com- 
plaints of  the  wet  weather  in  London, 
and  much  self-pity  for  the  long  imprison- 
ment in-doors.  Why,  those  very  people 
don't  know  what  weather  inconveniences 
are.  If  London  streets  are  muddy,  at 
all  events  there  are  no  dangerous  mo- 
rasses in  them.  No  matter  how  much  it 
rains,  people  get  their  comfortable  meals 
three  times  a  day.  Here,  rain  means  a 
risk  of  starvation  (if  the  little  wooden 
bridge  between  us  and  the  town  were  to 
be  swept  away)  and  a  certainty  of  short 
commons.  A  wet  morning  means  damp 
bread  for  breakfast  and  a  thousand  other 
disagreeables.  No,  I  have  no  patience  with 
the  pampered  Londoners,  who  want  per- 
petual sunshine  in  addition  to  their  other 
blessings,  for  saying  one  word  about  dis- 
comfort. They  are  all  much  too  civilized 
and  luxurious,  and  their  lives  are  made 
altogether  too  smooth  for  them.  Let  them 
come  out  here  and  try  to  keep  house  on 
the  top  of  a  hill  with  servants  whose  lan- 
guage they  don't  understand,  a  couple  of 
noisy  children  and  a  small  income,  and 
then,  as  dear  Mark  Twain  says,  "  they'll 
know  something  about  woe." 


iv. 


D'URBAN,  January  3,  1876. 

I  MUST  certainly  begin  this  letter  by 
setting  aside  every  other  topic  for  the 
moment  and  telling  you  of  our  grand 
event,  our  national  celebration,  our  his- 
torical New  Year's  Day.  We  have  "turn- 
ed the  first  sod"  of  our  first  inland  rail- 
way, and,  if  I  am  correctly  informed,  at 
least  a  dozen  sods  more,  but  you  must 
remember,  if  you  please,  that  our  nav- 
vies are  Kafirs,  and  that  they  do  not  un- 
derstand what  Mr.  Carlyle  calls  the  beau- 
ty and  dignity  of  labor  in  the  least.  It  is 
all  very  well  for  you  conceited  dwellers 
in  the  Old  and  New  Worlds  to  laugh  at 
us  for  making  such  a  fuss  about  a  pro- 
jected hundred  miles  of  railway  —  you 
whose  countries  are  made  into  dissected 
maps  by  the  magic  iron  lines  —  but  for 
poor  us,  who  have  to  drag  every  pound 
of  sugar  and  reel  of  sewing-cotton  over 
some  sixty  miles  of  vile  road  between 
this  and  Maritzburg,  such  a  line,  if  it  be 
ever  finished,  will  be  a  boon  and  a  bless- 
ing indeed. 

I  think  I  can  better  make  you  under- 
stand how  great  a  blessing  if  I  describe 
my  journeys  up  and  down  —  journeys 
made,  too,  under  exceptionally  favorable 
circumstances.  The  first  thing  which 
had  to  be  done,  some  three  weeks  before 
the  day  of  our  departure,  was  to  pack 
and  send  down  by  wagon  a  couple  of 
portmanteaus  with  our  smart  clothes.  I 
may  as  well  mention  here  that  the  cost 
of  the  transit  came  to  fourteen  shillings 
each  way  for  three  or  four  small,  light 
packages,  and  that  on  each  occasion  we 
were  separated  from  our  possessions  for 
a  fortnight  or  more.  The  next  step  to 
be  taken  was  to  secure  places  in  the  daily 
post-cart,  and  it  required  as  much  min- 
gled firmness  and  persuasion  to  do  this 
as  though  it  had  reference  to  a  political 
crisis.  But  then  there  were  some  hun- 
dreds of  us  Maritzburgians  all  wanting 
to  be  taken  down  to  D 'Urban  within  the 
space  of  a  few  days,  and  there  was  noth- 
34 


ing  to  take  us  except  the  open  post-cart, 
which  occupied  six  hours  on  the  journey, 
and  an  omnibus,  which  took  ten  hours, 
but  afforded  more  shelter  from  possible 
rain  and  probable  sun.  Within  the  two 
vehicles  some  twenty  people  might,  at  a 
pinch,  find  places,  and  at  least  a  hun- 
dred wanted  to  go  every  day  of  that  last 
week  of  the  old  year.  I  don't  know  how 
the  others  managed :  they  must  have  got 
down  somehow,  for  there  they  were  in 
great  force  when  the  eventful  day  had 
arrived. 

This  first  journey  was  prosperous,  de- 
ceitfully prosperous,  as  though  it  would 
fain  try  to  persuade  us  that  after  all  there 
was  a  great  deal  to  be  said  in  favor  of  a 
mode  of  traveling  which  reminded  one 
of  the  legends  of  the  glories  of  the  old 
coaching  days.  No  dust — for  there  had 
been  heavy  rain  a  few  days  before — a 
perfect  summer's  day,  hot  enough  in  the 
sun,  but  not  disagreeably  hot  as  we  bowl- 
ed along,  fast  as  four  horses  could  go,  in 
the  face  of  a  soft,  balmy  summer  breeze. 
We  were  packed  as  tightly  as  we  could 
fit  —  two  of  us  on  the  coach -box,  with 
the  mail  -  bags  under  our  feet  and  the 
driver's  elbows  in  our  ribs.  The  ordi- 
nary light  dog-cart  which  daily  runs  be- 
tween Maritzburg  and  D'Urban  was  ex- 
changed for  a  sort  of  open  break,  strong 
indeed,  but  very  heavy,  one  would  fancy, 
for  the  poor  horses,  who  had  to  scamper 
along  up  and  down  veldt  and  berg,  over 
bog  and  spruit,  with  this  lumbering  con- 
veyance at  their  heels.  Not  for  long, 
though  :  every  seven  miles,  or  even  less, 
we  pulled  up — sometimes  at  a  tidy  inn, 
where  a  long  table  would  be  set  in  the 
open  verandah  laden  with  eatables  (for 
driving  fast  through  the  air  sharpens 
even  the  sturdy  colonial  appetite),  some- 
times at  a  lonely  shanty  by  the  road- 
side, from  whence  a  couple  of  Kafir  lads 
emerged  tugging  at  the  bridles  of  the 
fresh  horses.  But  I  am  bound  to  say 
that  although  each  of  these  teams  did 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


35 


a  stage  twice  a  day,  although  they  were 
ill-favored  and  ill-groomed,  their  harness 
shabby  beyond  description,  and  their 
general  appearance  most  forlorn,  they 
were  one  and  all  in  good  condition  and 
did  their  work  in  first -rate  style.  The 
wheelers  were  generally  large,  gaunt  and 
most  hideous  animals,  but  the  leaders  oft- 
en were  ponies  who,  one  could  imagine, 
under  happier  circumstances  might  be 
handsome  little  horses  enough,  staunch 
and  willing  to  the  last  degree.  They 
knew  their  driver's  cheery  voice  as  well 
as  possible,  and  answered  to  every  cry 
and  shout  of  encouragement  he  gave 
them  as  we  scampered  along.  Of  course, 
each  horse  had  its  name,  and  equally  of 
course  "Sir  Garnet"  was  there  in  a  team 
with  "  Lord  GifTord"  and  "  Lord  Carnar- 
von "  for  leaders.  Did  we  come  to  a 
steep  hillside,  up  which  any  respectable 
English  horse  would  certainly  expect  to 
walk  in  a  leisurely,  sober  fashion,  then 
our  driver  shook  out  his  reins,  blew  a 
ringing  blast  on  his  bugle,  and  cried, 
"Walk  along,  Lord  Gifford  !  think  as 
you've  another  Victoriar  Cross  to  get  top 
o*  this  hill !  Walk  along,  Lord  Carnar- 
von !  you  ain't  sitting  in  a  cab'net  coun- 
cil here,  you  know.  Don't  leave  Sir 
Garnet  do  all  the  work,  you  know.  For- 
ward, my  lucky  lads  !  creep  up  it !"  and 
by  the  time  he  had  shrieked  out  this  and 
a  lot  more  patter,  behold  !  we  were  at  the 
top  of  the  hill,  and  a  fresh,  lovely  land- 
scape was  lying  smiling  in  the  sunshine 
below  us.  It  was  a  beautiful  country  we 
passed  through,  but,  except  for  a  scat- 
tered homestead  here  and  there  by  the 
roadside,  not  a  sign  of  a  human  dwelling 
on  all  its  green  and  fertile  slopes.  How 
the  railway  is  to  drag  itself  up  and  round 
all  those  thousand  and  one  spurs  run- 
ning into  each  other,  with  no  distinct 
valley  or  flat  between,  is  best  known  to 
the  engineers  and  surveyors,  who  have 
declared  it  practicable.  To  the  non-pro- 
fessional eye  it  seems  not  only  difficult, 
but  impossible.  But  oh  how  it  is  want- 
ed !  All  along  the  road  shrill  bugle- 
blasts  warned  the  slow,  trailing  ox- 
wagons,  with  their  naked  "forelooper" 
at  their  head,  to  creep  aside  out  of  our 
way.  I  counted  one  hundred  and  twen- 


ty wagons  that  day  on  fifty  miles  of  road. 
Now,  if  one  considers  that  each  of  these 
wagons  is  drawn  by  a  span  of  some  thir- 
ty or  forty  oxen,  one  has  some  faint  idea 
of  how  such  a  method  of  transport  must 
waste  and  use  up  the  material  of  the 
country.  Something  like  ten  thousand 
oxen  toil  over  this  one  road  summer  and 
winter,  and  what  wonder  is  it  not  only 
that  merchandise  costs  more  to  fetch  up 
from  D'Urban  to  Maritzburg  than  it  does 
to  bring  it  out  from  England,  but  that 
beef  is  dear  and  bad  !  As  transport  pays 
better  than  farming,  we  hear  on  all  sides 
of  farms  thrown  out  of  cultivation,  and 
as  a  necessary  consequence  milk,  butter, 
and  so  forth  are  scarce  and  poor,  and  in 
the  neighborhood  of  Maritzburg,  at  least, 
it  is  esteemed  a  favor  to  let  you  have 
either  at  exorbitant  prices  and  of  most 
inferior  quality.  When  one  looks  round 
at  these  countless  acres  of  splendid  graz- 
ing-land,  making  a  sort  of  natural  park 
on  either  hand,  it  seems  like  a  bad  dream 
to  know  that  we  have  constantly  to  use 
preserved  milk  and  potted  meat  as  be- 
ing cheaper  and  easier  to  procure  than 
fresh. 

No  one  was  in  any  mood,  however,  to 
discuss  political  economy  that  beautiful 
day,  and  we  laughed  and  chatted,  and 
ate  a  great  many  luncheons,  chiefly  of 
tea  and  peaches,  all  the  way  along.  Our 
driver  enlivened  the  route  by  pointing 
out  various  spots  where  frightful  accidents 
had  occurred  to  the  post-cart  on  former 
occasions :  "  You  see  that  big  stone  ? 
Well,  it  war  jest  there  that  Langabilile 
and  Colenso,  they  takes  the  bits  in  their 
teeth,  those  'osses  do,  and  they  sets  off 
their  own  pace  and  their  own  way.  Jim 
Stanway,  he  puts  his  brake  down  hard 
and  his  foot  upon  the  reins,  but,  Lord 
love  you !  them  beasts  would  ha'  pulled 
his  arms  and  legs  both  off  afore  they'd 
give  in.  So  they  runs  poor  Jim's  near 
wheel  right  up  agin  that  bank  and  upsets 
the  whole  concern,  as  neat  as  needs  be, 
over  agin  that  bit  o'  bog.  Anybody 
hurt  ?  Well,  yes  :  they  was  all  what  you 
might  call  shook.  Mr.  Bell,  he  had  his 
arm  broke,  and  a  foreign  chap  from  the 
diamond-fields,  he  gets  killed  outright, 
and  Jim  himself,  had  his  head  cut  open. 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


It  was  a  bad  business,  you  bet,  and  rough 
upon  Jim.  Ja !" 

All  the  driver's  conversation  is  inter- 
larded with  "  Ja"  but  he  never  says 
a  worse  word  than  that,  and  he  drinks 
nothing  but  tea.  As  for  a  pipe,  or  a 
cigar  even,  when  it  is  offered  to  him  he 
screws  up  his  queer  face  into  a  droll 
grimace  and  says,  "  No — thanks.  I  want 
all  my  nerves,  I  do,  on  this  bit  of  road. 
— Walk  along,  Lady  Barker :  I'm  asham- 
ed of  you,  I  am,  hanging  your  head  like 
that  at  a  bit  of  a  hill!"  It  was  rather 
startling  to  hear  this  apostrophe  all  of  a 
sudden,  but  as  my  namesake  was  a  very 
hard-working  little  brown  mare,  I  could 
only  laugh  and  declare  myself  much 
flattered. 

Here  we  are  at  last,  amid  the  tropical 
vegetation  which  makes  a  green  and 
tangled  girdle  around  D' Urban  for  a 
dozen  miles  inland  :  yonder  is  the  white 
and  foaming  line  of  breakers  which 
marks  where  the  strong  current,  sweep- 
ing down  the  east  coast,  brings  along 
with  it  all  the  sand  and  silt  it  can  collect, 
especially  from  the  mouth  of  the  Um- 
geni  River  close  by,  and  so  forms  the 
dreaded  bar  which  divides  the  outer 
from  the  inner  harbor.  Beyond  this 
crisp  and  sparkling  line  of  heaving,  toss- 
ing snow  stretches  the  deep  indigo-blue 
of  the  Indian  Ocean,  whilst  over  all 
wonderful  sunset  tints  of  opal  and  flame- 
color  are  hovering  and  changing  with 
the  changing,  wind-driven  clouds.  Be- 
neath our  wheels  are  many  inches  of 
thick  white  sand,  but  the  streets  are  gay 
and  busy,  with  picturesque  coolies  in  their 
bright  cotton  draperies  and  swiftly-pass- 
ing Cape  carts  and  vehicles  of  all  sorts. 
We  are  in  D'Urban  indeed — D'Urban 
in  unwonted  holiday  dress  and  on  the 
tippest  tiptoe  of  expectation  and  excite- 
ment. A  Cape  cart,  with  a  Chinese  coo- 
lie driver,  and  four  horses  apparently  put 
in  harness  together  for  the  first  time,  was 
waiting  for  us  and  our  luggage  at  the 
post-office.  We  got  into  it,  and  straight- 
way began  to  plunge  through  the  sandy 
streets  once  more,  turning  off  the  high- 
road and  beginning  almost  immediately 
to  climb  with  pain  and  difficulty  the  red 
sandy  slopes  of  the  Berea,  a  beautiful 


wooded  upland  dotted  with  villas.  The 
road  is  terrible  for  man  and  beast,  and 
we  had  to  stop  every  few  yards  to  breathe 
the  horses.  At  last  our  destination  is 
reached,  through  fields  of  sugar-cane 
and  plantations  of  coffee,  past  luxuriant 
fruit  trees,  rustling,  broad-leafed  bananas 
and  encroaching  greenery  of  all  sorts, 
to  a  clearing  where  a  really  handsome 
house  stands,  with  hospitable,  wide-open 
doors,  awaiting  us.  Yes,  a  good  big  bath 
first,  then  a  cup  of  tea,  and  now  we  are 
ready  for  a  saunter  in  the  twilight  on  the 
wide  level  terrace  (called  by  the  ugly 
Dutch  name  "stoop")  which  runs  round 
three  sides  of  the  house.  How  green 
and  fragrant  and  still  it  all  is  !  Straight- 
way the  glare  of  the  long  sunny  day,  the 
rattle  and  jolting  of  the  post-cart,  the 
toil  through  the  sand,  all  slip  away  from 
mind  and  memory,  and  the  tranquil  de- 
licious present,  "with  its  odors  of  rest 
and  of  love,"  slips  in  to  soothe  and  calm 
our  jaded  senses.  Certainly,  it  is  hotter 
here  than  in  Maritzburg — that  assertion 
we  are  prepared  to  die  in  defence  of — 
but  we  acknowledge  that  the  heat  at  this 
hour  is  not  oppressive,  and  the  tropical 
luxuriance  of  leaf  and  flower  all  around 
is  worth  a  few  extra  degrees  of  tempera- 
ture. Of  course,  our  talk  is  of  to-mor- 
row, and  we  look  anxiously  at  the  pur- 
pling clouds  to  the  -west. 

"A  fine  day,"  says  our  host;  and  so 
it  ought  to  be  with  five  thousand  people 
come  from  far  and  wide  to  see  the  sight. 
Why,  that  is  more  than  a  quarter  of  the 
entire  white  population  of  Natal !  Bed 
and  sleep  become  very  attractive  sugges- 
tions, though  made  indecently  soon  after 
dinner,  and  it  is  somewhere  about  ten 
o'clock  when  they  are  carried  out,  and, 
like  Lord  Houghton's  famous  "fair  little 
girl,"  we 

Know  nothing  more  till  again  it  is  day. 

A  fine  day,  too,  is  this  same  New  Year's 
Day  of  1876 — a  glorious  day — sunny  of 
course,  but  with  a  delicious  breeze  steal- 
ing among  the  flowers  and  shrubs  in  ca- 
pricious puffs,  and  snatching  a  differing 
scent  from  each  heavy  cluster  of  blos- 
som it  visits.  By  mid-day  F has 

got  himself  into  his  gold-laced  coat  and 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


37 


has  lined  the  inside  of  his  cocked  hat 
with  plaintain-leaves.  He  has  also  groan- 
ed much  at  the  idea  of  substituting  this 
futile  head-gear  for  his  hideous  but  con- 
venient pith  helmet.  I  too  have  donned 
my  best  gown,  and  am  horrified  to  find 
how  much  a  smart  bonnet  (the  first  time 
I  have  needed  to  wear  one  since  I  left 
England)  sets  off  and  brings  out  the 
shades  of  tan  in  a  sun-browned  face ; 
and  for  a  moment  I  too  entertain  the 
idea  of  retreating  once  more  to  the  pro- 
tecting depths  of  my  old  shady  hat.  But 
a  strong  conviction  of  the  duty  one  owes 
to  a  "  first  sod,"  and  the  consoling  reflec- 
tion that,  after  all,  everybody  will  be 
equally  brown  (a  fallacy,  by  the  way : 
the  D'Urban  beauties  looked  very  blanch- 
ed by  this  summer  weather),  supported 
me,  and  I  followed  F and  his  cock- 
ed hat  into  the  waiting  carriage. 

No  need  to  ask,  "Where  are  we  to 
go  ?"  All  roads  lead  to  the  first  sod  to- 
day. We  are  just  a  moment  late  :  F 

has  to  get  out  of  the  carriage  and  plunge 
into  the  sand,  madly  rushing  off  to  find 
and  fall  into  his  place  in  the  procession, 
and  we  turn  off  to  secure  our  seats  in 
the  grand  stand.  But  before  we  take 
them  I  must  go  and  look  at  the  wheel- 
barrow and  spade,  and  above  all  at  the 
"first  sod."  For  some  weeks  past  it  has 
been  a  favorite  chaff  with  us  Maritz- 
burgians  to  offer  to  bring  a  nice  fresh, 
lively  sod  down  with  us,  but  we  were 
assured  D'Urban  could  furnish  one. 
Here  it  is  exactly  under  the  triumphal 
arch,  looking  very  faded  and  depressed, 
with  a  little  sunburned  grass  growing 
feebly  on  it,  but  still  a  genuine  sod  and 
no  mistake.  The  wheelbarrow  was  real- 
ly beautiful,  made  of  native  woods  with 
their  astounding  names.  All  three  speci- 
mens of  the  hardest  and  handsomest 
yellow  woods  were  there,  and  they  were 
described  to  me  as,  "stink-wood,  breeze- 
wood  and  sneeze-wood."  The  rich  yel- 
low of  the  wood  is  veined  by  handsome 
dark  streaks,  with  "  1876"  inlaid  in  large 
black  figures  in  the  centre.  The  spade 
was  just  a  common  spade,  and  could  not 
by  any  possibility  be  called  anything  else. 
But  there  is  no  time  to  linger  and  laugh 
any  longer  beneath  all  these  fluttering 


streamers  and  waving  boughs,  for  here 
are  the  Natal  Carbineers,  a  plucky  little 
handful  of  light  horse  clad  in  blue  and 
silver,  who  have  marched,  at  their  own 
charges,  all  the  way  down  from  Maritz- 
btirg  to  help  keep  the  ground  this  fine 
New  Year's  Day.  Next  come  a  strong 
body  of  Kafir  police,  trudging  along 
through  the  dust  with  odd  shuffling 
gait,  bended  knees,  bare  legs,  bodies 
leaning  forward,  and  keeping  step  and 
time  by  means  of  a  queer  sort  of  bar- 
baric hum  and  grunt.  Policemen  are 
no  more  necessary  than  my  best  bonnet : 
they  are  only  there  for  the  same  reason 
— for  the  honor  and  glory  of  the  thing. 
The  crowd  is  kept  in  order  by  somebody 
here  and  there  with  a  ribboned  wand, 
for  it  is  the  most  orderly  and  respectable 
crowd  you  ever  saw.  In  fact,  such  a  crowd 
would  be  an  impossibility  in  England  or 
any  highly-civilized  country.  There  are 
no  dodging  vagrants,  no  slatternly  wo- 
men, no  squalid,  starving  babies.  In 
fact,  our  civilization  has  not  yet  mount- 
ed to  effervescence,  so  we  have  no  dregs. 
Every  white  person  on  the  ground  was 
well  clad,  well  fed,  and  apparently  well- 
to-do.  The  "  lower  orders  "  were  repre- 
sented by  a  bright  fringe  of  coolies  and 
Kafirs,  sleek,  grinning  and  as  fat  as  or- 
tolans, especially  the  babies.  Most  of 
the  Kafirs  were  dressed  in  snow-white 
knickerbockers  and  shirts  bordered  by 
gay  bands  of  color,  with  fillets  of  scar- 
let ribbon  tied  round  their  heads,  while 
as  for  the  coolies,  they  shone  out  like  a 
shifting  bed  of  tulips,  so  bright  were  the 
women's  chuddahs  and  the  men's  jack- 
ets. All  looked  smiling,  healthy  and 
happy,  and  the  public  enthusiasm  rose 
to  its  height  when  to  the  sound  of  a  vig- 
orous band  (it  is  early  yet  in  the  day, 
remember,  O  flute  and  trombone  !)  a  per- 
fect liliputian  mob  of  toddling  children 
came  on  the  ground.  These  little  peo- 
ple were  all  in  their  cleanest  white  frocks 
and  prettiest  hats :  they  clung  to  each 
other  and  to  their  garlands  and  staves 
of  flowers  until  the  tangled  mob  remind- 
ed one  of  a  May-Day  fete.  Not  that  any 
English  May  Day  of  my  acquaintance 
could  produce  such  a  lavish  profusion  of 
roses  and  buds  and  blossoms  of  every 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


hue  and  tint,  to  say  nothing  of  such  a 
sun  and  sky.  The  children's  corner  was 
literally  like  a  garden,  and  nothing  could 
be  prettier  than  the  effect  of  their  little 
voices  shrilling  up  through  the  summer 
air,  as,  obedient  to  a  lifted  wand,  they 
burst  into  the  chorus  of  the  national 
anthem  when  the  governor  and  mayor 
drove  up.  Cheers  from  white  throats; 
gruff,  loud  shouts  all  together  of  Bay  etc  ! 
(the  royal  salute)  and  Inkosi!  ("chief- 
tain") from  black  throats;  yells,  ex- 
pressive of  excitement  and  general  good- 
fellowship,  from  throats  of  all  colors. 
Then  a  moment's  solemn  pause,  a  hush- 
ed silence,  bared  heads,  and  the  loud, 
clear  tones  of  a  very  old  pastor  in  the 
land  were  heard  imploring  the  blessing 
of  Almighty  God  on  this  our  undertak- 
ing. Again  the  sweet  childish  trebles  rose 
into  the  sunshine  in  a  chanted  Amen, 
and  then  there  were  salutes  from  cannon, 
feux-de-joie  from  carbines,  and  more 
shoutings,  and  all  the  cocked  hats  were 
to  be  seen  bowing ;  and  then  one  more 
tremendous  burst  of  cheering  told  that 
the  sod  was  cut  and  turned  and  trundled, 
and  finally  pitched  out  of  the  new  bar- 
row back  again  upon  the  dusty  soil — all 
in  the  most  artistic  and  satisfactory  fash- 
ion. "  There  are  the  Kafir  navvies  :  they 
are  really  going  to  work  now."  (This  lat- 
ter with  great  surprise,  for  a  Kafir  really 
working,  now  or  ever,  would  indeed  have 
been  the  raree-show  of  the  day.)  But 
this  natural  phenomenon  was  left  to 
develop  itself  in  solitude,  for  the  crowd 
began  to  reassemble  into  processions, 
and  generally  to  find  its  way  under 
shelter  from  sun  and  dust.  The  five 
hundred  children  were  heralded  and 
marched  off  to  the  tune  of  one  of  their 
own  pretty  hymns  to  where  unlimited 
buns  and  tea  awaited  them,  and  we  eld- 
ers betook  ourselves  to  the  grateful  shade 
and  coolness  of  the  flower-decked  new 
market-hall,  open  to-day  for  the  first 
time,  and  turned  by  flags  and  ferns  and 
lavish  wealth  of  what  in  England  are 
costliest  hot-house  flowers  into  a  charm- 
ing banqueting-hall.  All  these  exquisite 
ferns  and  blossoms  cost  far  less  than  the 
string  and  nails  which  fastened  them 
against  the  walls,  and  their  fresh  fra- 


grance and  greenery  struck  gratefully 
on  our  sun-baked  eyes  as  we  found  our 
way  into  the  big  room. 

Nothing  could  be  more  creditable  to  a 
young  colony  than  the  way  everything 
was  arranged,  for  the  difficulties  in  one's 
culinary  path  in  Natal  are  hardly  to  be 
appreciated  by  English  housekeepers.  At 
one  time  there  threatened  to  be  almost  a 
famine  in  D'Urban,  for  besides  the  pres- 
sure of  all  these  extra  mouths  of  visitors 
to  feed,  there  was  this  enormous  lunch- 
eon, with  some  five  hundred  hungry 
people  to  be  provided  for.  It  seems  so 
strange  that  with  every  facility  for  rear- 
ing poultry  all  around  it  should  be  scarce 
and  dear,  and  when  brought  to  market 
as  thin  as  possible.  The  same  may  be 
said  of  vegetables  :  they  need  no  culture 
beyond  being  put  in  the  ground,  and  yet 
unless  you  have  a  garden  of  your  own 
it  is  very  difficult  to  get  anything  like  a 
proper  supply.  I  heard  nothing  but  wails 
from  distracted  housekeepers  about  the 
price  and  scarcity  of  food  that  week. 
However,  the  luncheon  showed  no  sign 
of  scarcity,  and  I  was  much  amused  at 
the  substantial  and  homely  character 
of  the  menu,  which  included  cold  baked 
sucking  pig  among  its  delicacies.  A 
favorite  specimen  of  the  confectioner's 
art  that  day  consisted  of  a  sort  of  solid 
brick  of  plum  pudding,  with,  for  legend, 
"  The  First  Sod  "  tastefully  picked  out  in 
white  almonds  on  its  dark  surface.  But 
it  was  a  capital  luncheon,  and  so  soon 
as  the  mayor  had  succeeded  in  impress- 
ing on  the  band  that  they  were  not  ex 
pected  to  play  all  the  time  the  speeches 
were  being  made,  everything  went  on 
very  well.  Some  of  the  speeches  were 
short,  but  oh !  far,  far  too  many  were 
long,  terribly  long,  and  the  whole  affair 
was  not  over  before  five  o'clock.  The 
only  real  want  of  the  entertainment  was 
ice.  It  seems  so  hard  not  to  have  it  in 
a  climate  which  can  produce  such  burn- 
ing days,  for  those  tiresome  cheap  little 
ice-machines  with  crystals  are  of  no  use 
whatever.  I  got  one  which  made  ice 
(under  pressure  of  much  turning)  in  the 
ship,  but  it  has  never  made  any  here, 
and  my  experience  is  that  of  everybody 
else.  Why  there  should  not  be  an  ice- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


39 


making  or  an  ice-importing  company  no 
one  knows,  except  that  there  is  so  little 
energy  or  enterprise  here  that  everything 
is  davvdly  and  uncomfortable  because  it 
seems  too  much  trouble  to  take  pains  to 
supply  wants.  It  is  the  same  everywhere 
throughout  the  colony  :  sandy  roads  with 
plenty  of  excellent  materials  for  harden- 
ing them  close  by  ;  no  fish  to  be  bought 
because  no  one  will  take  the  trouble  of 
going  out  to  catch  them.  But  I  had  bet- 
ter stop  scribbling,  for  I  am  evidently 
getting  tired  after  my  long  day  of  un- 
wonted festivity.  It  is  partly  the  oppres- 
sion of  my  best  bonnet,  and  partly  the 
length  of  the  speeches,  which  have  wea- 
ried me  out  so  thoroughly. 

MAKITZBURG,  January  6. 

Nothing  could  afford  a  greater  con- 
trast than  our  return  journey.  It  was 
the  other  extreme  of  discomfort  and  mis- 
ery, and  must  surely  have  been  sent  to 
make  us  appreciate  and  long  for  the  com- 
pletion of  this  very  railway.  We  waited 
a  day  beyond  that  fixed  for  our  return, 
in  order  to  give  the  effects  of  a  most  ter- 
rific thunderstorm  time  to  pass  away,  but 
it  was  succeeded  by  a  perfect  deluge  of 
rain.  Rain  is  not  supposed  to  last  long 
at  this  season  of  the  year,  but  all  I  can 
say  is  that  this  rain  did  last.  When  the 
third  day  came  and  brought  no  sign 
of  clearing  up  with  it,  and  very  little 
down  to  speak  of,  we  agreed  to  delay  no 
longer ;  besides  which  our  places  in  the 
post-cart  could  not  be  again  exchanged, 
as  had  previously  been  done,  for  the 
stream  of  returning  visitors  was  setting 
strongly  toward  Maritzburg,  and  we 
might  be  detained  for  a  week  longer  if 
we  did  not  go  at  once.  Accordingly,  we 
presented  ourselves  at  the  D' Urban  post- 
office  a  few  minutes  before  noon  and 
took  our  places  in  the  post-cart.  My 
seat  was  on  the  box,  antf  as  I  flattered 
myself  that  I  was  well  wrapped  up,  I  did 
not  feel  at  all  alarmed  at  the  prospect 
of  a  cold,  wet  drive.  Who  would  be- 
lieve that  twenty -four  hours  ago  one 
could  hardly  endure  a  white  muslin 
dressing  -  gown  ?  Who  w^ould  believe 
that  twenty-four  hours  ago  a  lace  shawl 
was  an  oppressive  wrap,  and  that  the 


serious  object  of  my  envy  and  admira- 
tion all  these  hot  days  on  the  Berea  has 
been  a  fat  Abyssinian  baby,  as  black  as 
a  coal,  and  the  strongest  and  biggest 
child  one  ever  saw.  That  sleek  and 
grinning  infant's  toilette  consisted  of  a 
string  of  blue  beads  round  its  neck,  and 
in  this  cool  and  airy  costume  it  used  to 
pervade  the  house,  walking  about  on  all 
fours  exactly  like  a  monkey,  for  of  course 
it  could  not  stand.  Yet,  how  cold  that 
baby  must  be  to-day !  But  if  it  is,  its 
mother  has  probably  tied  it  behind  her 
in  an  old  shawl,  and  it  is  nestling  close 
to  her  fat  broad  back  fast  asleep. 

But  the  baby  is  certainly  a  most  un- 
warrantable digression,  and  we  must  re- 
turn to  our  post-cart.  The  discouraging 
part  of  it  was  that  the  vehicle  itself  had 
been  in  all  the  storm  and  rain  of  yester- 
day. Of  course  no  one  had  dreamed  of 
washing  or  wiping  it  out  in  any  fashion, 
so  we  had  to  sit  upon  wet  cushions  and 
put  our  feet  into  a  pool  of  red  mud  and 
water.  Now,  if  I  must  confess  the  truth, 
I,  an  old  traveler,  had  done  a  very  stupid 
thing.  I  had  been  lured  by  the  deceitful 
beauty  of  the  weather  when  we  started 
into  leaving  behind  me  everything  except 
the  thinnest  and  coolest  garments  I  pos- 
sessed, and  I  therefore  had  to  set  out  on 
this  journey  in  the  teeth  of  a  cold  wind 
and  driving  rain  clad  in  a  white  gown. 
It  is  true,  I  had  my  beloved  and  most 
useful  ulster,  but  it  wras  a  light  water- 
proof one,  and  just  about  half  enough  in 
the  way  of  warmth.  Still,  as  I  had  an- 
other wrap,  a  big  Scotch  plaid,  I  should 
have  got  along  very  well  if  it  had  not 
been  for  the  still  greater  stupidity  of  the 
only  other  female  fellow-passenger,  who 
calmly  took  her  place  in  the  open  post- 
cart  behind  me  in  a  brown  holland  gown, 
without  scarf  or  wrap  or  anything  what- 
ever to  shelter  her  from  the  weather,  ex- 
cept a  white  calico  sunshade.  She  was 
a  Frenchwoman  too,  and  looked  so  pit- 
eous and  forlorn  in  her  neat  toilette,  al- 
ready drenched  through,  that  of  course 
I  could  do  nothing  less  than  lend  her  my 
Scotch  shawl,  and  trust  to  the  driver's 
friendly  promises  of  empty  corn-bags  at 
some  future  stage.  By  the  time  the  bags 
came — or  rather  by  the  time  we  got  to 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


the  bags — I  was  indeed  wet  and  cold. 
The  ulster  did  its  best,  and  all  that  could 
be  expected  of  it,  but  no  garment  manu- 
factured in  a  London  shop  could  possi- 
bly cope  with  such  wild  weather,  tropical 
in  the  vehemence  of  its  pouring  rain, 
wintry  in  its  cutting  blasts.  The  wind 
seemed  to  blow  from  every  quarter  of 
the  heavens  at  once,  the  rain  came  down 
in  sheets,  but  I  minded  the  mud  more 
than  either  wind  or  rain :  it  was  more 
demoralizing.  On  the  box-seat  I  got  my 
full  share  and  more,  but  yet  I  was  better 
off  there  than  inside,  where  twelve  people 
were  squeezed  into  the  places  of  eight. 
The  horses'  feet  got  balled  with  the  stiff 
red  clay  exactly  as  though  it  had  been 
snow,  and  from  time  to  time  as  they  gal- 
loped along,  six  fresh  ones  at  every  stage, 
I  received  a  good  lump  of  clay,  as  big 
and  nearly  as  solid  as  a  croquet-ball,  full 
in  my  face.  It  was  bitterly  cold,  and  the 
night  was  closing  in  when  we  drove  up 
to  the  door  of  the  best  hotel  in  Maritz- 
burg,  at  long  past  eight  instead  of  six 
o'clock.  It  was  impossible  to  get  out  to 
our  own  place  that  night,  so  there  was 
nothing  for  it  but  to  stay  where  we  were, 
and  get  what  food  and  rest  could  be  coax- 
ed out  of  an  indifferent  bill  of  fare  and  a 
bed  of  stony  hardness,  to  say  nothing  of 
the  bites  of  numerous  mosquitoes.  The 
morning  light  revealed  the  melancholy 
state  of  my  unhappy  white  gown  in  its 
full  horror.  All  the  rivers  of  Natal  will 
never  make  it  white  again,  I  fear.  Cer- 
tainly there  is  much  to  be  said  in  favor 
of  railway-traveling,  after  all,  especially 
in  wet  weather. 

JANUARY  10. 

Surely,  I  have  been  doing  something 
else  lately  besides  turning  this  first  sod  ? 
Well,  not  much.  You  see,  no  one  can 
undertake  anything  in  the  way  of  expe- 
ditions or  excursions,  or  even  sight-see- 
ing, in  summer,  partly  on  account  of  the 
heat,  and  partly  because  of  the  thunder- 
storms. We  have  had  a  few  very  severe 
ones  lately,  but  we  hail  them  with  joy  on 
account  of  the  cool  clear  atmosphere 
which  succeeds  to  a  display  of  electrical 
vehemence.  We  walked  home  from 
church  a  few  evenings  ago  on  a  very 


wild  and  threatening  night,  and  I  never 
shall  forget  the  weird  beauty  of  the  scene. 
We  had  started  to  go  to  church  about 
six  o'clock  :  the  walk  was  only  two  miles, 
and  the  afternoon  was  calm  and  cloud- 
less. The  day  had  been  oppressively 
hot,  but  there  were  no  immediate  signs 
of  a  storm.  While  we  were  in  church, 
however,  a  fresh  breeze  sprang  up  and 
drove  the  clouds  rapidly  before  it.  The 
glare  of  the  lightning  made  every  corner 
of  the  church  as  bright  as  day,  and  the 
crash  of  the  thunder  shook  the  wooden 
roof  over  our  heads.  But  there  was  no 
rain  yet,  and  when  we  came  out — in  fear 
and  trembling,  I  confess,  as  to  how  we 
were  to  get  home — we  could  see  that  the 
violence  of  the  storm  had  either  passed 
over  or  not  yet  reached  the  valley  in 
which  Maritzburg  nestles,  and  was  ex- 
pending itself  somewhere  else.  So  F— 
decided  that  we  might  venture.  As  for 
vehicles  to  be  hired  in  the  streets,  there 
are  no  such  things,  and  by  the  time  we 
could  have  persuaded  one  to  turn  out  for 
us  —  a  very  doubtful  contingency,  and 
only  to  be  procured  at  the  cost  of  a  sove- 
reign or  so  —  the  full  fury  of  the  storm 
would  probably  be  upon  us.  There  was 
nothing  for  it,  therefore,  but  to  walk,  and 
so  we  set  out  as  soon  as  possible  to  climb 
our  very  steep  hill.  Instead  of  the  soft, 
balmy  twilight  on  which  we  had  counted, 
the  sky  was  of  an  inky  blackness,  but 
for  all  that  we  had  light  enough  and  to 
spare.  I  never  saw  such  lightning.  The 
flashes  came  literally  every  second,  and 
lit  up  the  whole  heavens  and  earth  with  a 
blinding  glare  far  brighter  than  any  sun- 
shine. So  great  was  the  contrast,  and  so 
much  more  intense  the  darkness  after  each 
flash  of  dazzling  light,  that  we  could  only 
venture  to  walk  on  during  the  flashes, 
though  one's  instinct  was  rather  to  stand 
still,  awestricken  and  mute.  The  thunder 
growled  and  cracked  incessantly,  but  far 
away,  toward  the  Inchanga  Valley.  If 
the  wind  had  shifted  ever  so  little  and 
brought  the  storm  back  again,  our  plight 
would  have  been  poor  indeed  ;  and  with 
this  dread  upon  us  we  trudged  bravely 
on  and  breasted  the  hillside  with  what 
haste  and  courage  we  could.  During 
the  rare  momentary  intervals  of  darkness 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


we  could  perceive  that  the  whole  place 
was  ablaze  with  fireflies.  Every  blade 
of  grass  held  a  tiny  sparkle  of  its  own, 
but  when  the  lightning  shone  out  with 
its  yellow  and  violet  glare  the  modest 
light  of  the  poor  little  fireflies  seemed  to 
be  quite  extinguished.  As  for  the  frogs, 
the  clamorous  noise  they  kept  up  sound- 
ed absolutely  deafening,  and  so  did  the 
shrill,  incessant  cry  of  the  cicalas.  We 
reached  home  safely  and  before  the  rain 
fell,  but  found  all  our  servants  in  the  ve- 
randah in  the  last  stage  of  dismay  and 
uncertainty  what  to  do  for  the  best.  They 
had  collected  waterproofs,  umbrellas  and 
lanterns  ;  but  as  it  was  not  actually  rain- 
ing yet,  and  we  certainly  did  not  require 
light  on  our  path — for  they  said  that  each 
flash  showed  them  our  climbing,  trudg- 
ing figures  as  plainly  as  possible — it  was 
difficult  to  know  what  to  do,  especially 
as  the  Kafirs  have,  very  naturally,  an 
intense  horror  and  dislike  to  going  out 
in  a  thunderstorm.  This  storm  was  not 
really  overhead  at  all,  and  scarcely  de- 
serves mention  except  as  the  precursor 
of  a  severe  one  of  which  our  valley  got 
the  full  benefit.  It  was  quite  curious  to 
see  the  numbers  of  dead  butterflies  on 
the  garden-paths  after  that  second  storm. 
Their  beautiful  plumage  was  not  dimmed 
or  smirched  nor  their  wings  broken :  they 
would  have  been  in  perfect  order  for  a 
naturalist's  collection  ;  yet  they  were  quite 
dead  and  stiff.  The  natives  declare  it  is 
the  lightning  which  kills  them  thus. 

My  own  private  dread  —  to  return  to 
that  walk  home  for  a  moment — was  of 
^stepping  on  a  snake,  as  there  are  a  great 
many  about,  and  one  especial  variety,  a 
small  poisonous  brown  adder,  is  of  so 
torpid  and  lazy  a  nature  that  it  will  not 
glide  out  of  your  way,  as  other  snakes 
do,  but  lets  you  tread  on  it  and  then  bites 
you.  It  is  very  marvelous,  considering 
how  many  snakes  there  are,  that  one 

hears  of  so  few  bad  accidents.     G is 

always  poking  about  in  likely  places  for 
them,  as  his  supreme  ambition  is  to  see 
one.  I  fully  expect  a  catastrophe  some 
day,  and  keep  stores  of  ammonia  and 
brandy  handy.  Never  was  such  a  fear- 
less little  monkey.  He  is  always  scam- 
pering about  on  his  old  Basuto  pony,  and 


of  course  tumbles  off  now  and  then  ;  but 
he  does  not  mind  it  in  the  least.  When 
he  is  not  trying  to  break  his  neck  in  this 
fashion  he  is  clown  by  himself  at  the  riv- 
er fishing,  or  he  is  climbing  trees,  or 
down  a  well  which  is  being  dug  here, 
or  in  some  piece  of  mischief  or  other. 
The  sun  and  the  fruit  are  my  betes  noires, 
but  neither  seems  to  hurt  him,  though  I 
really  don't  believe  that  any  other  child 
in  the  world  has  ever  eaten  so  many 
apricots  at  one  time  as  he  has  been  do- 
ing lately.  This  temptation  has  just  been 
removed,  however,  for  during  our  short 
absence  at  D'Urban  every  fruit  tree  has 
been  stripped  to  the  bark — every  peach 
and  plum,  every  apple  and  apricot,  clean 
gone.  Of  course,  no  one  has  done  it, 
but  it  is  very  provoking  all  the  same,  for 
it  used  to  be  so  nice  to  take  the  baby  out 
very  early,  and  pick  up  the  fallen  apri- 
cots for  breakfast.  The  peaches  are 
nearly  all  pale  and  rather  tasteless,  but 
the  apricots  are  excellent  in  flavor,  of  a 
large  size  and  in  extraordinary  abun- 
dance. There  was  also  a  large  and 
promising  crop  of  apples,  but  they  have 
all  been  taken  in  their  unripe  state.  As 
a  rule,  the  Kafirs  are  scrupulously  hon- 
est, and  we  left  plate  and  jewelry  in  the 
house  under  Charlie's  care  whilst  we  were 
away,  without  the  least  risk,  for  such 
things  they  would  never  touch ;  but  fruit 
or  mealies  they  cannot  be  brought  to 
regard  as  personal  property,  and  they 
gather  the  former  and  waste  the  latter 
without  scruple.  It  is  a  great  objection 
to  the  imported  coolies,  who  make  very 
clean  and  capital  servants,  that  they 
have  inveterate  habits  of  pilfering  and 
are  hopelessly  dishonest  about  trifles. 
For  this  reason  they  are  sure  to  get  on 
badly  with  Kafir  fellow  -  servants,  who 
are  generally  quite  above  any  tempta- 
tion of  that  kind. 

JANUARY  14. 

A  few  days  ago  we  took  G to  see 

the  annual  swimming  sports  in  the  small 
river  which  runs  through  the  park.  It 
was  a  beautiful  afternoon,  for  a  wonder, 
with  no  lowering  thunder-clouds  over  the 
hills,  so  the  banks  of  the  river  were 
thronged  for  half  a  mile  and  more  with 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


spectators.  It  made  a  very  pretty  pic- 
ture, the  large  willow  trees  drooping  into 
the  water  on  either  shore,  the  gay  con- 
course of  people,  the  bright  patch  of 
color  made  by  the  red  coats  of  the  band 
of  the  regiment  stationed  across  the 
stream,  the  tents  for  the  competitors  to 
change  in,  the  dark  wondering  faces  of 
Kafirs  and  coolies,  who  cannot  compre- 
hend why  white  people  should  take  so 
much  trouble  and  run  so  much  risk  to 
amuse  themselves.  We  certainly  must 
appear  to  them  to  be  possessed  by  a 
restless  demon  of  energy,  both  in  our 
work  and  our  play,  and  never  more  so 
than  on  this  hot  afternoon,  when,  amid 
much  shouting  and  laughing,  the  vari- 
ous water-races  came  off.  The  steeple- 
chase amused  us  a  great  deal,  where  the 
competitors  had  to  swim  over  and  under 
various  barriers  across  the  river ;  and  so 
did  the  race  for  very  little  boys,  which 
was  a  full  and  excellent  one.  The  mon- 
keys took,  to  the  water  as  naturally  as 
fishes,  and  evidently  enjoyed  the  fun 
more  than  any  one.  Indeed,  the  dif- 
ficulty was  to  get  them  out  of  the  water 
and  into  the  tents  to  change  their  swim- 
ming costume  after  the  race  was  over. 
But  the  most  interesting  event  was  one 
meant  to  teach  volunteers  how  to  swim 
rivers  in  case  of  field  service,  and  the 
palm  lay  between  the  Natal  Carbineers 
and  a  smart  body  of  mounted  police.  At 
a  given  signal  they  all  plunged  on  horse- 
back into  the  muddy  water,  and  from 
a  very  difficult  part  of  the  bank  too, 
and  swam,  fully  accoutred  and  carrying 
their  carbines,  across  the  river.  It  was 
very  interesting  to  watch  how  clever  the 
horses  were,  and  how  some  of  their 
riders  slipped  off  their  backs  the  mo- 
ment they  had  fairly  entered  the  stream 
and  swam  side  by  side  with  their  steeds 
until  the  opposite  bank  was  reached ; 
and  then  how  the  horses  paused  to  allow 
their  dripping  masters  to  mount  again — 
no  easy  task  in  heavy  boots  and  saturated 
clothes,  with  a  carbine  in  the  left  hand  j 
which  had  to  be  kept  dry  at  all  risks  and 

hazards.     When   I  asked  little   G 

which  part  he  liked  best,  he  answered 
without  hesitation,  "  The  assidents  "  (an- 
gli9e,  accidents),  and  I  am  not  sure  that 


he  was  not  right ;  for,  is  no  Dne  vas 
hurt,  the  crowd  mightily  enjoyed  seeing 
some  stalwart  citizen  in  his  best  clothes 
suddenly  topple  from  his  place  of  van- 
tage on  the  deceitfully  secure-looking  but 
rotten  branch  of  a  tree  and  take  an  in- 
voluntary bath  in  his  own  despite.  When 
that  citizen  further  chanced  to  be  clad  in 
a  suit  of  bright-colored  velveteen  the  ef- 
fect was  much  enhanced.  It  is  my  pri- 
vate opinion  that  G was  longing  to 

distinguish  himself  in  a  similar  fashion, 
for  I  constantly  saw  him  "lying  out"  on 
most  frail  branches,  but  try  as  he  might, 
he  could  not  accomplish  a  tumble. 

JANUARY  17. 

I  have  had  an  opportunity  lately  of 
attending  a  Kafir  ///  de  justice,  and  I 
can  only  say  that  if  we  civilized  people 
managed  our  legal  difficulties  in  the 
same  way  it  would  be  an  uncommonly 
good  thing  for  everybody  except  the  law- 
yers. Cows  are  at  the  bottom  of  nearly 
all  the  native  disputes,  and  the  Kafirs 
always  take  their  grievance  soberly  to 
the  nearest  magistrate,  who  arbitrates  to 
the  best  of  his  ability  between  the  dis- 
putants. They  are  generally  satisfied 
with  his  award,  but  if  the  case  is  an  in- 
tricate one,  or  they  consider  that  the 
question  is  not  really  solved,  then  they 
have  the  right  of  appeal,  and  it  is  this 
court  of  appeal  which  I  have  been  attend- 
ing lately.  It  is  held  in  the  newly-built 
office  of  the  minister  for  native  affairs — 
the  prettiest  and  most  respectable-look- 
ing public  office  which  I  have  seen  in 
Maritzburg,  by  the  way.  Before  the 
erection  of  this  modest  but  comfortable 
building  the  court  used  to  be  held  out  in 
the  open  air  under  the  shade  of  some 
large  trees — a  more  picturesque  method 
of  doing  business,  certainly,  but  subject 
to  inconveniences  on  account  of  the 
weather.  It  is  altogether  the  most  prim- 
itive and  patriarchal  style  of  business 
one  ever  saw,  but  all  the  more  delightful 
on  that  account. 

It  is  inexpressibly  touching  to  see  with 
one's  own  eyes  the  wonderfully  deep 
personal  devotion  and  affection  of  the 
Kafirs  for  the  kindly  English  gentleman 
who  for  thirty  years  and  more  has  been 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA, 


43 


their  real  ruler  and  their  wise  and  judi- 
cious friend.  Not  a  friend  to  pamper 
their  vices  and  give  way  to  their  great 
fault  of  idleness,  but  a  true  friend  to  pro- 
tect their  interests,  and  yet  to  labor  inces- 
santly for  their  social  advancement  and 
for  their  admission  into  the  great  field 
of  civilized  workers.  The  Kafirs  know 
little  and  care  less  for  all  the  imposing 
and  elaborate  machinery  of  British  rule  ; 
the  queen  on  her  throne  is  but  a  fair  and 
distant  dream-woman  to  them  ;  Sir  Gar- 
net himself,  that  great  inkosi,  was  as 
nobody  in  their  eyes  compared  to  their 
own  chieftain,  their  king  of  hearts,  the 
one  white  man  to  whom  of  their  own 
free  will  and  accord  they  give  the  royal 
salute  whenever  they  see  him.  I  have 
stood  in  magnificent  halls  and  seen  king 
and  kaiser  pass  through  crowds  of  bow- 
ing courtiers,  but  I  never  saw  anything 
which  impressed  me  so  strongly  as  the 
simultaneous  springing  to  the  feet,  the 
loud  shout  of  Bayete !  given  with  the 
right  hand  upraised  (a  higher  form  of 
salutation  than  Inkosi  !  and  only  accord- 
ed to  Kafir  royalty),  the  look  of  love 
and  rapture  and  satisfied  expectation  in 
all  those  keen  black  faces,  as  the  min- 
ister, quite  unattended,  without  pomp  or 
circumstance  of  any  sort  or  kind,  quiet- 
ly walked  into  the  large  room  and  sat 
himself  down  at  his  desk  with  some  pa- 
pers before  him.  There  was  no  clerk, 
no  official  of  any  sort :  no  one  stood  be- 
tween the  people  and  the  fountain  of 
justice.  The  extraordinary  simplicity 
of  the  trial  which  commenced  was  only 
to  be  equaled  by  the  decorum  and  dig- 
nity with  which  it  was  conducted.  First 
of  all,  everybody  sat  down  upon  the  floor, 
the  plaintiff  and  defendant  amicably  side 
by  side  opposite  to  the  minister's  desk, 
and  the  other  natives,  about  a  hundred 
in  number,  squatted  in  various  groups. 
Then,  as  there  was  evidently  a  slight 
feeling  of  surprise  at  my  sitting  myself 
down  in  the  only  other  chair — they  prob- 
ably considered  me  a  new  -  fashioned 
clerk — the  minister  explained  that  I  was 
the  wife  of  another  inkosi,  and  that  I 
wanted  to  see  and  hear  how  Kafirmen 
stated  their  case  when  anything  went 
wrong  with  their  affairs.  This  explana- 


tion was  perfectly  satisfactory  to  all  pai- 
ties,  and  they  regarded  me  no  more,  but 
immediately  set  to  work  on  the  subject 
in  hand.  A  sort  of  precis  of  each  case 
had  been  previously  prepared  from  the 
magistrate's  report  for  Mr.  S 's  in- 
formation by  his  clerk,  and  these  docu- 
ments greatly  helped  me  to  understand 
what  was  going  on.  No  language  can 
be  more  beautiful  to  listen  to  than  either 
the  Kafir  or  Zulu  tongue :  it  is  soft  and  liq- 
uid as  Italian,  with  just  the  same  gentle 
accentuation  on  the  penultimate  and  an- 
tepenultimate syllables.  The  clicks  which 
are  made  with  the  tongue  every  now  and 
then,  and  are  part  of  the  language,  give 
it  a  very  quaint  sound,  and  the  proper 
names  are  excessively  harmonious. 

In  the  first  cause  which  was  taken  the 
plaintiff,  as  I  said  before,  was  not  quite 
satisfied  with  the  decision  of  his  own 
local  magistrate,  and  had  therefore  come 
here  to  restate  his  case.  The  story  was 
slightly  complicated  by  the  plaintiff  hav- 
ing two  distinct  names  by  which  he  had 
been  known  at  different  times  of  his  life. 
"Tevula,"  he  averred,  was  the  name  of 
his  boyhood,  and  the  other,  "  Mazumba," 
the  name  of  his  manhood.  The  natives 
have  an  unconquerable  aversion  to  giv- 
ing their  real  names,  and  will  offer  half 
a  dozen  different  aliases,  making  it  very 
difficult  to  trace  them  if  they  are  "want- 
ed," and  still  more  difficult  to  get  at  the 
rights  of  any  story  they  may  have  to  tell. 
However,  if  they  are  ever  frank  and 
open  to  anybody,  it  is  to  their  own  min- 
ister, who  speaks  their  language  as  well 
as  they  do  themselves,  and  who  fully 
understands  their  mode  of  reasoning  and 
their  habits  of  mind. 

Tevula  told  his  story  extremely  well, 
I  must  say — quietly,  but  earnestly,  and 
with  the  most  perfectly  respectful  though 
manly  bearing.  He  sometimes  used 
graceful  and  natural  gesticulation,  but 
not  a  bit  more  than  was  needed  to  give 
emphasis  to  his  oratory.  He  was  a 
strongly-built,  tall  man,  about  thirty-five 
years  of  age,  dressed  in  a  soldier's  great- 
coat— for  it  was  a  damp  and  drizzling 
day  —  had  bare  legs  and  feet,  and  wore 
nothing  on  his  head  except  the  curious 
ring  into  which  the  men  weave  their  hair. 


44 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


So  soon  as  a  youth  is  considered  old 
enough  to  assume  the  duties  and  re- 
sponsibilities of  manhood  he  begins  to 
weave  his  short  crisp  hair  over  a  ring  of 
grass  which  exactly  fits  the  head,  keep- 
ing the  woolly  hair  in  its  place  by  means 
of  wax.  -  In  time  the  hair  grows  perfect- 
ly smooth  and  shining  and  regular  over 
this  firm  foundation,  and  the  effect  is  as 
though  it  were  a  ring  of  jet  or  polished 
ebony  worn  round  the  brows.  Different 
tribes  slightly  vary  the  size  and  form  of 
the  ring ;  and  in  this  case  it  was  easy 
to  see  that  the  defendant  belonged  to  a 
different  tribe,  for  his  ring  was  half  the 
size,  and  worn  at  the  summit  of  a  cone 
of  combed-back  hair  which  was  as  thick 
and  close  as  a  cap,  and  indeed  looked 
very  like  a  grizzled  fez.  Anybody  in 
court  may  ask  any  questions  he  pleases, 
and  in  fact  what  we  should  call  "cross- 
examine"  a  witness,  but  no  one  did 
so  whilst  I  was  present.  Every  one  lis- 
tened attentively,  giving  a  grunt  of  in- 
terest whenever  Tevula  made  a  point; 
and  this  manifestation  and  sympathy  al- 
ways seemed  to  gratify  him  immensely. 
But  it  was  plain  that,  whatever  might  be 
the  decision  of  the  minister,  who  listen- 
ed closely  to  every  word,  asking  now  and 
then  a  short  question — which  evidently 
hit  some  logical  nail  right  on  the  head — 
they  would  abide  by  it,  and  be  satisfied 
that  it  was  the  fairest  and  most  equitable 
solution  of  the  subject. 

Here  is  a  resume  of  the  first  case,  and 
it  is  a  fair  sample  of  the  intricacies  of  a 
Kafir  lawsuit:  Our  friend  Tevula  pos- 
sesses an  aged  relative,  a  certain  aunt, 
called  Mamusa,  who  at  the  present  time 
appears  to  be  in  her  dotage,  and  conse- 
quently her  evidence  is  of  very  little 
value.  But  once  upon  a  time  —  long, 
long  ago — Mamusa  was  young  and  gen- 
erous: M-amusa  had  cows,  and  s\\zgave 
or  lent — there  was  the  difficulty — a  cou- 
ple of  heifers  to  the  defendant,  whose 
name  I  can't  possibly  spell  on  account 
of  the  clicks.  Nobody  denies  that  of  her 
own  free  will  these  heifers  had  been  be- 
stowed by  Mamusa  on  the  withered-look- 
ing little  old  man  squatting  opposite,  but 
the  question  is,  Were  they  a  loan  or  a 
gift  ?  For  many  years  nothing  was  done  ! 


about  these  heifers,  but  one  fine  day  Te- 
vula gets  wind  of  the  story,  is  immedi- 
ately seized  with  a  fit  of  affection  for  his 
aged  relative,  and  takes  her  to  live  in  his 
kraal,  proclaiming  himself  her  protector 
and  heir.  So  far  so  good :  all  this  was 
in  accordance  with  Kafir  custom,  and 
the  narration  of  this  part  of  the  story  was 
received  with  grunts  of  asseveration  and 
approval  by  the  audience.  Indeed,  Ka- 
firs are  as  a  rule  to  be  depended  upon, 
and  their  minds,  though  full  of  odd  prej- 
udices and  quirks,  have  a  natural  bias 
toward  truth.  Two  or  three  years  ago 
Tevula  began  by  claiming,  as  heir-at- 
law,  though  the  old  woman  still  lives, 
twenty  cows  from  the  defendant  as  the 
increase  of  these  heifers :  now  he  de- 
mands between  thirty  and  forty.  When 
asked  why  he  only  claimed  twenty,  as 
nobody  denies  that  the  produce  of  the 
heifers  has  increased  to  double  that  num- 
ber, he  says  naively,  but  without  hesita- 
tion, that  there  is  a  fee  to  be  paid  of  a 
shilling  a  head  on  such  a  claim  if  estab- 
lished, and  that  he  only  had  twenty  shil- 
lings in  the  world ;  so,  as  he  remarked 
with  a  knowing  twinkle  in  his  eye,  "What 
was  the  use  of  my  claiming  more  cows 
than  I  had  money  to  pay  the  fee  for  ?" 
But  times  have  improved  with  Tevula 
since  then,  and  he  is  now  in  a  position 
to  claim"  the  poor  defendant's  whole  herd, 
though  he  generously  says  he  will  not  in- 
sist on  his  refunding  those  cows  which 
do  not  resemble  the  original  heifers,  and 
are  not,  as  they  were,  dun  and  red  and 
white.  This  sounded  magnanimous,  and 
met  with  grunts  of  approval  until  the 
blear-eyed  defendant  remarked,  hope- 
lessly, "They  are  all  of  those  colors," 
which  changed  the  sympathies  of  the 
audience  once  more.  Tevula  saw  this 
at  a  glance,  and  hastened  to  improve 
his  position  by  narrating  an  anecdote. 
No  words  of  mine  could  reproduce  the 
dramatic  talent  that  man  displayed  in 
his  narration.  I  did  not  understand  a 
syllable  of  his  language,  and  yet  I  could 
gather  from  his  gestures,  his  intonation, 
and  above  all  from  the  expression  of  his 
hearers'  faces,  the  sort  of  story  he  was 
telling  them.  After  he  had  finished,  Mr. 
S turned  to  me  and  briefly  trans- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


45 


lated  the  episode  with  which  Tevula  had 
sought  to  rivet  the  attention  and  sym- 
pathy of  the  court.  Tevula's  tale,  much 
condensed,  was  this :  Years  ago,  when 
his  attention  had  first  been  directed  to 
the  matter,  he  went  with  the  defendant 
out  on  the  veldt  to  look  at  the  herd.  No 
sooner  did  the  cattle  see  them  approach- 
ing than  a  beautiful  little  dun-colored 
heifer,  the  exact  counterpart  of  her 
grandmother  ( Mamusa's  cow),  left  the 
others  and  ran  up  to  him,  Tevula,  lowing 
and  rubbing  her  head  against  his  shoul-  | 
der,  and  following  him  all  about  like  a 
dog.  In  vain  did  her  reputed  owner  try 
to  drive  her  away :  she  persisted  in  fol- 
lowing Tevula  all  the  way  back  to  his 
kraal,  right  up  to  the  entrance  of  his  hut. 
"  I  was  her  master,  and  the  inkomokazi 
knew  it,"  cried  Tevula  triumphantly, 
looking  round  at  the  defendant  with  a 
knowing  nod,  as  much  as  to  say,  "  Beat 
that,  if  you  can  !"  Not  knowing  what 
answer  to  make,  the  defendant  took  his 
snuff-box  out  of  his  left  ear  and  solaced 
himself  with  three  or  four  huge  pinches. 
I  started  the  hypothesis  that  Mamusa 
might  once  have  had  a  tcndresse  for  the 
old  gentleman,  and  might  have  bestow- 
ed these  cows  upon  him  as  a  love-gift ; 
but  this  idea  was  scouted,  even  by  the 
defendant,  who  said  gravely,  "  Kafir  wo- 
men don't  buy  lovers  or  husbands :  we 
buy  the  wife  we  want."  A  Kafir  girl  is 
exceedingly  proud  of  being  bought,  and 
the  more  she  costs  the  prouder  she  is. 
She  pities  English  women,  whose  bride- 
grooms expect  to  receive  money  instead 
of  paying  it,  and  considers  a  dowry  as  a 
most  humiliating  arrangement. 

I  wish  I  could  tell  you  how  Mamusa's 
cows  have  finally  been  disposed  of,  but, 
although  it  has  occupied  three  days,  the 
case  is  by  no  means  over  yet.  I  envy 

and  admire  Mr.  S 's  untiring  patience 

and  unfailing  good-temper,  but  it  is  just 
these  qualities  which  make  his  Kafir 
subjects  (for  they  really  consider  him  as 


their  ruler)  so  certain  that  their  affairs 
will  not  be  neglected  or  their  interests 
suffer  in  his  hands. 

Whilst  I  was  listening  to  Tevula's  or- 
atory my  eyes  and  my  mind  sometimes 
wandered  to  the  eager  and  silent  audi- 
ence, and  I  amused  myself  by  studying 
their  strange  head-dresses.  In  most  in- 
stances the  men  wore  their  hair  in  the 
woven  rings  to  which  I  have  alluded, 
but  there  were  several  young  men  pres- 
ent who  indulged  in  purely  fancy  head- 
dresses. One  stalwart  youth  had  got 
hold  of  the  round  cardboard  lid  of  a  col- 
lar-box, to  which  he  had  affixed  two  bits 
of  string,  and  tied  it  firmly  but  jauntily 
on  one  side  of  his  head.  Another  lad 
had  invented  a  most  extraordinary  dec- 
oration for  his  wool  -  covered  pate,  and 
one  which  it  is  exceedingly  difficult  to 
describe  in  delicate  language.  He  had 
procured  the  intestines  of  some  small 
animal,  a  lamb  or  a  kid,  and  had  cleaned 
and  scraped  them  and'tied  them  tightly, 
at  intervals  of  an  inch  or  two,  with  string. 
This  series  of  small  clear  bladders  he  had 
then  inflated,  and  arranged  them  in  a 
sort  of  bouquet  on  the  top  of  his  head, 
skewering  tufts  of  his  crisp  hair  between, 
so  that  the  effect  resembled  a  bunch  of 
bubbles,  if  there  could  be  such  a  thing. 
Another  very  favorite  adornment  for  the 
head  consisted  of  a  strip  of  gay  cloth  or 
ribbon,  or  of  even  a  few  bright  threads, 
bound  tightly  like  a  fillet  across  the  brows 
and  confining  a  tuft  of  feathers  over  one  , 
ear  ;  but  I  suspect  all  these  fanciful  ar- 
rangements were  only  worn  by  the  gilded 
youth  of  a  lower  class,  because  I  noticed 
that  the  chieftains  and  indunas,  or  head- 
men of  the  villages,  never  wore  such 
frivolities.  They  wore  indeed  numerous 
slender  rings  of  brass  or  silver  wire  on 
their  straight,  shapely  legs,  and  also 
necklaces  of  lions'  or  tigers'  claws  and 
teeth  round  their  throats,  but  these  were 
trophies  of  the  chase  as  well  as  personal 
ornaments. 


MARITZBURG,  February  10,  1876. 

IN  the  South  African  calendar  this  is 
set  down  as  the  first  of  the  autumnal 
months,  but  the  half  dozen  hours  about 
mid-day  are  still  quite  as  close  and  op- 
pressive as  any  we  have  had.  I  am, 
however,  bound  to  say  that  the  nights — 
at  all  events,  up  here — are  cooler,  and  I 
begin  even  to  think  of  a  light  shawl  for 
my  solitary  walks  in  the  verandah  just 
before  bedtime.  When  the  moon  shines 
these  walks  are  pleasant  enough,  but 
when  only  the  "common  people  of  the 
skies"  are  trying  to  filter  down  their 
feebler  light  through  the  misty  atmo- 
sphere, I  have  a  lurking  fear  and  dis- 
trust of  the  reptiles  and  bugs  who  may 
also  have  a  fancy  for  promenading  at 
the  same  time  and  in  the  same  place. 
I  say  nothing  of  bats,  frogs  and  toads, 
mantis  or  even  huge  moths :  to  these 
we  are  quite  accustomed.  But  although 
I  have  never  seen  a  live  snake  in  this 
country  myself,,  still  one  hears  such  un- 
pleasant stories  about  them  that  it  is  just 
as  well  to  what  the  Scotch  call  "  mak  sic- 
car"  with  a  candle  before  beginning  a 
constitutional  in  the  dark. 

It  is  not  a  week  ago  since  a  lady  of 
my  acquaintance,  being  surprised  at  her 
little  dog's  refusal  to  follow  her  into  her 
bedroom  one  night,  instituted  a  search 
for  the  reason  of  the  poor  little  crea- 
ture's terror  and  dismay,  and  discover- 
ed a  snake  coiled  up  under  her  chest  of 
drawers.  At  this  moment,  too,  the  local 
papers  are  full  of  recipes  for  the  preven- 
tion and  cure  of  snake-bites,  public  at- 
tention being  much  attracted  to  the  sub- 
ject on  account  of  an  Englishman  hav- 
ing been  bitten  by  a  black  "mamba" 
(a  very  venomous  adder)  a  short  time 
since,  and  having  died  of  the  wound  in  a 
few  hours.  In  his  case,  poor  man  !  there 
does  not  seem  to  have  been  a  chance 
from  the  first,  for  he  was  obliged  to  walk 
some  distance  to  the  nearest  house,  and 
as  they  had  no  proper  remedies  there, 
46 


he  had  to  be  taken  on  a  farther  journey 
of  some  miles  to  a  hospital.  All  this  ex- 
ercise and  motion  caused  the  poison  to 
circulate  freely  through  the  veins,  and 
was  the  worst  possible  thing  for  him. 
The  doctors  here  seem  agreed  that  the 
treatment  of  ammonia  and  brandy  is  the 
safest,  and  many  instances  are  adduced 
to  show  how  successful  it  has  been,  though 
one  party  of  practitioners  admits  the  am- 
monia, but  denies  the  brandy.  On  the 
other  hand,  one  hears  of  a  child  bitten 
by  a  snake  and  swallowing  half  a  large 
bottle  of  raw  brandy  in  half  an  hour 
without  its  head  being  at  all  affected, 
and,  what  is  more,  recovering  from  the 
bite  and  living  happy  ever  after.  I  keep 
quantities  of  both  remedies  close  at  hand, 
for  three  or  four  venomous  snakes  have 
been  killed  within  a  dozen  yards  of  the 
house,  and  little  G is  perpetually  ex- 
ploring the  long  grass  all  around  or  hunt- 
ing for  a  stray  cricket-ball  or  a  pegtop  in 
one  of  those  beautiful  fern-filled  ditches 
whose  tangle  of  creepers  and  plumy  ferns 
is  exactly  the  favorite  haunt  of  snakes. 
As  yet  he  has  brought  back  from  these 
forbidden  raids  nothing  more  than  a  few 
ticks  and  millions  of  burs. 

As  for  the  ticks,  I  am  getting  over  my 
horror  at  having  to  dislodge  them  from 
among  the  baby's  soft  curls  by  means  of 

a  sharp  needle,  and  even  G only 

shouts  with  laughter  at  discovering  a 
great  swollen  monster  hanging  on  by  its 
forceps  to  his  leg.  They  torment  the 
poor  horses  and  dogs  dreadfully ;  and 
if  the  said  horses  were  not  the  very  qui- 
etest, meekest,  most  underbred  and  de- 
pressed animals  in  the  world,  we  should 
certainly  hear  of  more  accidents.  As  it 
is,  they  confine  their  efforts  to  get  rid  of 
their  tormentors  to  rubbing  all  the  hair 
off  their  tails  and  sides  in  patches  against 
the  stable  walls  or  the  trunk  of  a  tree. 
Indeed,  the  clever  way  G 's  misera- 
ble little  Basuto  pony  actually  climbs  in- 
side a  good-sized  bush,  and  sways  him- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


47 


self  about  in  it  with  his  legs  off  the  ground 
until  the  whole  thing  comes  with  a  crash 
to  the  ground,  is  edifying  to  behold  to 
every  one  except  the  owner  of  the  tree. 
Tom,  the  Kafir  boy,  tried  hard  to  per- 
suade me  the  other  day  that  the  pony 
was  to  blame  for  the  destruction  of  a 
peach  tree,  but  as  the  only  broken-down 
branches  were  those  which  had  been 
laden  with  fruit,  I  am  inclined  to  acquit 
the  pony.  Carbolic  soap  is  an  excellent 
thing  to  wash  both  dogs  and  horses  with, 
as  it  not  only  keeps  away  flies  and  ticks 
from  the  skin,  which  is  constantly  rubbed 
off  by  incessant  scratching,  but  helps  to 
heal  the  tendency  to  a  sore  place.  In- 
deed, nothing  frightened  me  so  much  as 
what  I  heard  when  I  first  arrived  about 
Natal  sores  and  Natal  boils.  Everybody 
told  me  that  ever  so  slight  a  cut  or  abra- 
sion went  on  slowly  festering,  and  that 
sores  on  children's  faces  were  quite  com- 
mon. This  sounded  very  dreadful,  but 
I  am  beginning  to  hope  it  was  an  exag- 
geration, for  whenever  G cuts  or 

knocks  himself  (which  is  every  day  or 
so),  or  scratches  an  insect's  bite  into  a 
bad  place,  I  wash  the  part  with  a  little 
carbolic  soap  (there  are  two  sorts — one 
for  animals  and  a  more  refined  prepara- 
tion for  the  human  skin),  and  it  is  quite 
well  the  next  day.  We  have  all  had  a 
threatening  of  those  horrid  boils,  but  they 
have  passed  off. 

In  town  the  mosquitoes  are  plentiful 
and  lively,  devoting  their  attentions 
chiefly  to  new-comers,  but  up  here — I 
write  as  though  we  were  five  thousand 
feet  instead  of  only  fifty  above  Maritz- 
burg — it  is  rare  to  see  one.  I  think  "  fillies" 
are  more  in  our  line,  and  that  in  spite 
of  every  floor  in  the  house  being  scrub- 
bed daily  with  strong  soda  and  water. 
"Fillies,"  you  must  know,  is  our  black 
groom's  (Charlie's)  way  of  pronouncing 
fleas,  and  I  find  it  ever  so  much  prettier. 
Charlie  and  I  are  having  a  daily  discus- 
sion just  now  touching  sundry  moneys 
he  expended  during  my  week's  absence 
at  D'Urban  for  the  kittens'  food.  Charlie 
calls  them  the  "lu"  catties,"  and  declares 
that  the  two  small  animals  consumed 
three  shillings  and  ninepence  worth  of 
meat  in  a  week  I  laughingly  say,  "  But, 


Charlie,  that  would  be  nearly  nine 
pounds  of  meat  in  six  days,  and  they 
couldn't  eat  that,  you  know."  Charlie 
grins  and  shows  all  his  beautiful  even 
white  teeth  :  then  he  bashfully  turns  his 
head  aside  and  says, "I  doan  know,  ma' : 
I  buy  six'  meat  dree  time."  "  Very  well, 
Charlie,  that  would  be  one  shilling  and 
sixpence."  "I  doan  know,  ma';"  and 
we've  not  got  any  further  than  that  yet. 

But  G and  I  are  picking  up  many 

words  of  Kafir,  and  it  is  quite  mortifying 
to  see  how  much  more  easily  the  little 
monkey  learns  than  I  do.  I  forget  my 
phrases  or  confuse  them,  whereas  when 
he  learns  two  or  three  sentences  he  ap- 
pears to  remember  them  always.  It  is  a 
very  melodious  and  beautiful  language, 
and,  except  for  the  clicks,  not  very  dif- 
ficult to  learn.  Almost  everybody  here 
speaks  it  a  little,  and  it  is  the  first  thing 
necessary  for  a  new-comer  to  endeavor 
to  acquire  ;  only,  unfortunately,  there  are 
no  teachers,  as  in  India,  and  consequent- 
ly you  pick  up  a  wretched,  debased  kind 
of  patois,  interlarded  with  Dutch  phrases. 
Indeed,  I  am  assured  there  are  two  words, 
el  has  hi  ("  the  horse  "),  of  unmistakable 
Moorish  origin,  though  no  one  knows 
how  they  got  into  the  language.  Many 
of  the  Kafirs  about  town  speak  a  little 
English,  and  they  are  exceedingly  sharp, 
when  they  choose,  about  understanding 
what  is  meant,  even  if  they  do  not  quite 
catch  the  meaning  of  the  words  used. 
There  is  one  genius  of  my  acquaintance, 
called  "Sixpence,"  who  is  not  only  a 
capital  cook,  but  an  accomplished  Eng- 
lish scholar,  having  spent  some  months 
in  England.  Generally,  to  Cape  Town 
and  back  is  the  extent  of  their  journey- 
ings,  for  they  are  a  home-loving  people  ; 
but  Sixpence  went  to  England  with  his 
master,  and  brought  back  a  shivering 
recollection  of  an  English  winter  and  a 
deep-rooted  amazement  at  the  boys  of 
the  Shoe  Brigade,  who  wanted  to  clean 
his  boots.  That  astonished  him  more 
than  anything  else,  he  says. 

The  Kafirs  are  very  fond  of  attending 
their  own  schools  and  church  services, 
of  which  there  are  several  in  the  town ; 
and  I  find  one  of  my  greatest  difficulties 
in  living  out  here  consists  in  getting  Ka- 


48 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


firs  to  come  out  of  town,  for  by  doing,  so 
they  miss  their  regular  attendance  at 
chapel  and  school.  A  few  Sundays  ago 
I  went  to  one  of  these  Kafir  schools,  and 
was  much  struck  by  the  intently -ab- 
sorbed air  of  the  pupils,  almost  all  of 
whom  were  youths  about  twenty  years 
of  age.  They  were  learning  to  read  the 
Bible  in  Kafir  during  my  visit,  sitting  in 
couples,  and  helping  each  other  on  with 
immense  diligence  and  earnestness.  No 
looking  about,  no  wandering,  inattentive 
glances,  did  I  see.  I  might  as  well  have 
"  had  the  receipt  of  fern-seed  and  walk- 
ed invisible"  for  all  the  attention  I  ex- 
cited. Presently  the  pupil  -  teacher,  a 
young  black  man,  who  had  charge  of 
this  class,  asked  me  if  I  would  like  to 
hear  them  sing  a  hymn,  and  on  my  as- 
senting he  read  out  a  verse  of  "  Hold 
the  Fort,"  and  they  all  stood  up  and 
sang  it,  or  rather  its  Kafir  translation, 
lustily  and  with  good  courage,  though 
without  much  tune.  The  chorus  was 
especially  fine,  the  words  "  Inkanye  kan- 
ye  "  ringing  through  the  room  with  great 
fervor.  This  is  not  a  literal  translation 
of  the  words  "Hold  the  Fort,"  but  it  is 
difficult,  as  the  teacher  explained  to  me, 
for  the  translator  to  avail  himself  of  the 
usual  word  for  "hold,"  as  it  conveys 
more  the  idea  of  "take  hold,"  "seize," 
and  the  young  Kafir  missionary  thor- 
oughly understood  all  the  nicety  of  the 
idiom.  There  was  another  class  for 
women  and  children,  but  it  was  a  small 
one.  Certainly,  the  young  men  seemed 
much  in  earnest,  and  the  rapt  expres- 
sion of  their  faces  was  most  striking, 
especially  during  the  short  prayer  which 
followed  the  hymn  and  ended  the  school 
for  the  afternoon. 

I  have  had  constantly  impressed  upon 
my  mind  since  my  arrival  the  advice  not 
to  take  Christian  Kafirs  into  my  service, 
but  I  am  at  a  loss  to  know  in  what  way 
the  prejudice  against  them  can  have 
arisen.  "Take  a  Kafir  green  from  his 
kraal  if  you  wish  to  have  a  good  servant," 
is  what  every  one  tells  me.  It  so  hap- 
pens that  we  have  two  of  each — two 
Christians  and  two  heathens — about  the 
place,  and  there  is  no  doubt  whatever 
which  is  the  best.  Indeed,  I  have  some- 


times conversations  with  the  one  who 
speaks  English,  and  I  can  assure  you  we 
might  all  learn  from  him  with  advantage. 
His  simple  creed  is  just  what  came  from 
the  Saviour's  lips  two  thousand  years 
ago,  and  comprises  His  teaching  of  the 
whole  duty  of  man — to  love  God,  the 
great  "En'  Kos,"  and  his  neighbor  as 
himself.  He  speaks  always  with  real 
delight  of  his  privileges,  and  is  very  anx- 
ious to  go  to  Cape  Town  to  attend  some 
school  there  of  which  he  talks  a  great 
deal,  and  where  he  says  he  should  learn 
to  read  the  Bible  in  English.  At  present 
he  is  spelling  it  out  with  great  difficulty 
in  Kafir.  This  man  often  talks  to  me 
in  the  most  respectful  and  civil  manner 
imaginable  about  the  customs  of  his 
tribe,  and  he  constantly  alludes  to  the 
narrow  escape  he  had  of  being  murder- 
ed directly  after  his  birth  for  the  crime 
of  being  a  twin.  His  people  have  a  fix- 
ed belief  that  unless  one  of  a  pair  of 
babies  be  killed  at  once,  either  the  fa- 
ther or  mother  will  die  within -the  year; 
and  they  argue  that  as  in  any  case  one 
child  will  be  sure  to  die  in  its  infancy, 
twins  being  proverbially  difficult  to  rear, 
it  is  only  both  kind  and  natural  to  kill 
the  weakly  one  at  once.  This  young 
man  is  very  small  and  quiet  and  gentle, 
with  an  ugly  face,  but  a  sweet,  intelligent 
expression  and  a  very  nice  manner.  I 
find  him  and  the  other  Christian  in  our 
employment  very  trustworthy  and  re- 
liable. If  they  tell  me  anything  which 
has  occurred,  I  know  I  can  believe  their 
version  of  it,  and  they  are  absolutely  hon- 
est. Now,  the  other  lads  have  very  loose 
ideas  on  the  subject  of  sugar,  and  make 
shifty  excuses  for  everything,  from  the 
cat  breaking  a  heavy  stone  filter  up  to 
half  the  marketing  being  dropped  on  the 
road. 

I  don't  think  I  have  made  it  sufficient- 
ly clear  that  besides  the  Sunday-schools 
and  services  I  have  mentioned  there 
are  night-schools  every  evening  in  the 
week,  which  are  fully  attended  by  Kafir 
servants,  and  where  they  are  first  taught 
to  read  their  own  language,  which  is  an 
enormous  difficulty  to  them.  They  al- 
ways tell  me  it  is  so  much  easier  to  learn 
to  read  English  than  Kafir ;  and  if  one 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


49 


studies  the  two  languages,  it  is  plain  to 
see  how  much  simpler  the  new  tongue 
must  appear  to  a  learner  than  the  intri- 
cate construction,  the  varying  patois  and 
the  necessarily  phonetic  spelling  of  a  lan- 
guage compounded  of  so  many  dialects 
as  the  Zulu-Kafir. 

FEBRUARY  12. 

In  some  respects  I  consider  this  cli- 
mate has  been  rather  over-praised.  Of 
course  it  is  a  great  deal — a  very  great 
deal — better  than  our  English  one,  but 
that,  after  all,  is  not  saying  much  in  its 
praise.  Then  we  must  remember  that 
in  England  we  have  the  fear  and  dread 
of  the  climate  ever  before  our  eyes,  and 
consequently  are  always,  so  to  speak,  on 
our  guard  against  it.  Here,  and  in  other 
places  where  civilization  is  in  its  infancy, 
we  are  at  the  mercy  of  dust  and  sun, 
wind  and  rain,  and  all  the  eccentric  ele- 
ments which  go  to  make  up  weather. 
Consequently,  when  the  balance  of  com- 
fort and  convenience  has  to  be  struck,  it 
is  surprising  how  small  an  advantage  a 
really  better  climate  gives  when  you  take 
away  watering-carts  and  shady  streets 
for  hot  weather,  and  sheltered  railway- 
stations  and  hansom  cabs  for  wet  weath- 
er, and  roads  and  servants  and  civility 
and  general  convenience  everywhere. 
This  particular  climate  is  both  depress- 
ing and  trying  in  spite  of  the  sunny 
skies  we  are  ever  boasting  about,  be- 
cause it  has  a  strong  tinge  of  the  tropical 
element  in  it;  and  yet  people  live  in 
much  the  same  kind  of  houses  (only  that 
they  are  very  small),  and  wear  much  the 
same  sort  of  clothes  (only  that  they  are 
very  ugly),  and  lead  much  the  same  sort 
of  lives  (only  that  it  is  a  thousand  times 
duller  than  the  dullest  country  village), 
as  they  do  in  England.  Some  small 
concession  is  made  to  the  thermometer 
in  the  matter  of  puggeries  and  matted 
floors,  but  even  then  carpets  are  used 
wherever  it  is  practicable,  because  this 
matting  never  looks  clean  and  nice  after 
the  first  week  it  is  put  down.  All  the 
houses  are  built  on  the  ground  floor,  with 
the  utmost  economy  of  building  material 
and  labor,  and  consequently  there  are 
no  passages :  every  room  is,  in  fact,  a 
4 


passage  and  leads  to  its  neighbor.  So 
the  perpetually  dirty  bare  feet,  or,  still 
worse,  boots  fresh  from  the  mud  or  dust 
of  the  streets,  soon  wear  out  the  mat- 
ting. Few  houses  are  at  all  prettily  dec- 
orated or  furnished,  partly  from  the  dif- 
ficulty of  procuring  anything  pretty  here, 
the  cost  and  risk  of  its  carriage  up  from 
D'Urban  if  you  send  to  England  for  it, 
and  partly  from  the  want  of  servants 
accustomed  to  anything  but  the  roughest 
and  coarsest  articles  of  household  use. 
A  lady  soon  begins  to  take  her  drawing- 
room  ornaments  en  guignon  if  she  has 
to  dust  them  herself  every  day  in  a  very 
dusty  climate.  I  speak  feelingly  and 
with  authority,  for  that  is  my  case  at 
this  moment,  and  applies  to  every  other 
part  of  the  house  as  well. 

I  must  say  I  like  Kafir  servants  in 
some  respects.  They  require,  I  acknow- 
ledge, constant  supervision  ;  they  require 
to  be  told  to  do  the  same  thing  over  and 
over  again  every  day ;  and,  what  is  more, 
besides  telling,  you  have  to  stand  by  and 
see  that  they  do  the  thing.  They  are 
also  very  slow.  But  still,  with  all  these 
disadvantages,  they  are  far  better  than 
the  generality  of  European  servants  out 
here,  who  make  their  luckless  employ- 
ers' lives  a  burden  to  them  by  reason  of 
their  tempers  and  caprices.  It  is  much 
better,  I  am  convinced,  to  face  the  evil 
boldly  and  to  make  up  one's  mind  to 
have  none  but  Kafir  servants.  Of  course 
one  immediately  turns  into  a  sort  of  over- 
seer and  upper  servant  one's  self;  but 
at  all  events  you  feel  master  or  mistress 
of  your  own  house,  and  you  have  faith- 
ful and  good-tempered  domestics,  who  do 
their  best,  however  awkwardly,  to  please 
you.  Where  there  are  children,  then  in- 
deed a  good  English  nurse  is  a  great 
boon ;  and  in  this  one  respect  I  am  for- 
tunate. Kafirs  are  also  much  easier  to 
manage  when  the  orders  come  direct 
from  the  master  or  mistress,  and  they 
work  far  more  willingly  for  them  than 
for  white  servants.  Tom,  the  nurse-boy, 
confided  to  me  yesterday  that  he  hoped 
to  stop  in  my  employment  for  forty  moons. 
After  that  space  of  time  he  considered 
that  he  should  be  in  a  position  to  buy 
plenty  of  wives,  who  would  work  for  him 


5° 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


and  support  him  for  the  rest  of  his  life. 
But  how  Tom  or  Jack,  or  any  of  the 
boys  in  fact,  are  to  save  money  I  know 
not,  for  every  shilling  of  their  wages,  ex- 
cept a  small  margin  for  coarse  snuff,  goes 
to  their  parents,  who  fleece  them  without 
mercy.  If  they  are  fined  for  breakages 
or  misconduct  (the  only  punishment  a 
Kafir  cares  for),  they  have  to  account  for 
the  deficient  money  to  the  stern  parents  ; 
and  both  Tom  and  Jack  went  through  a 
most  graphic  pantomime  with  a  stick  of 
the  consequences  to  themselves,  adding 
that  their  father  said  both  the  beating 
from  him  and  the  fine  from  us  served 
them  right  for  their  carelessness.  It 
seemed  so  hard  they  should  suffer  both 
ways,  and  they  were  so  good-tempered 
and  uncomplaining  about  it,  that  I  fear 
I  shall  find  it  very  difficult  to  stop  any 
threepenny  pieces  out  of  their  wages  in 
future.  A  Kafir  servant  usually  gets  one 
pound  a  month,  his  clothes  and  food. 
The  former  consists  of  a  shirt  and  short 
trousers  of  coarse  check  cotton,  a  sol- 
dier's old  great-coat  for  winter,  and  plen- 
ty of  mealy-meal  for  "scoff."  '  If  he  is  a 
good  servant  and  worth  making  comfort- 
able, you  give  him  a  trifle  every  week  to 
buy  meat.  Kafirs  are  very  fond  of  going 
to  their  kraals,  and  you  have  to  make 
them  sign  an  agreement  to  remain  with 
you  so  many  months,  generally  six.  By 
the  time  you  have  just  taught  them,  with 
infinite  pains  and  trouble,  how  to  do 
their  work,  they  depart,  and  you  have  to 
begin  it  all  over  again. 

I  frequently  see  the  chiefs  or  indunas 
of  chiefs  passing  here  on  their  way  to 
some  kraals  which  lie  just  over  the  hills. 
These  kraals  consist  of  half  a  dozen  or 
more  large  huts,  exactly  like  so  many 
huge  beehives,  on  the  slope  of  a  hill. 
There  is  a  rude  attempt  at  sod-fencing 
round  them  ;  a  few  head  of  cattle  graze 
in  the  neighborhood  ;  lower  down,  the 
hillside  is  roughly  scratched  by  the  wo- 
men with  crooked  hoes  to  form  a  mealy- 
ground.  (Cows  and  mealies  are  all  they 
require  except  snuff  or  tobacco,  which 
they  smoke  out  of  a  cow's  horn.)  They 
seem  a  very  gay  and  cheerful  people,  to 
judge  by  the  laughter  and  jests  I  hear 
from  the  groups  returning  to  these  kraals 


every  day  by  the  road  just  outside  our 
fence.  Sometimes  one  of  the  party  car- 
ries an  umbrella ;  and  I  assure  you  the 
effect  of  a  tall,  stalwart  Kafir,  clad  either 
in  nothing  at  all  or  else  in  a  sack,  care- 
fully guarding  his  bare  head  with  a  tat- 
tered Gamp,  is  very  ridiculous.  Often 
some  one  walks  along  playing  upon  a 
rude  pipe,  whilst  the  others  jog  before 
and  after  him,  laughing  and  capering 
like  boys  let  loose  from  school,  and  all 
chattering  loudly.  You  never  meet  a 
man  carrying  a  burden  unless  he  is  a 
white  settler's  servant.  When  a  chief 
or  the  induna  of  a  kraal  passes  this  way, 
I  see  him,  clad  in  a  motley  garb  of  red 
regimentals  with  his  bare  "ringed"  head, 
riding  a  sorry  nag,  only  the  point  of  his 
great  toe  resting  in  his  stirrup.  He  is 
followed  closely  and  with  great  empresse- 
ment  by  his  "  tail,"  all "  ringed"  men  also 
— that  is,  men  of  some  substance  and 
weight  in  the  community.  They  carry 
bundles  of  sticks,  and  keep  up  with  the 
ambling  nag,  and  are  closely  followed 
by  some  of  his  wives  bearing  heavy  loads 
on  their  heads,  but  stepping  out  bravely 
with  beautiful  erect  carriage,  shapely  bare 
arms  and  legs,  and  some  sort  of  coarse 
drapery  worn  across  their  bodies,  cover- 
ing them  from  shoulder  to  knee  in  folds 
which  would  delight  an  artist's  eye  and  be 
the  despair  of  a  sculptor's  chisel.  They 
don't  look  either  oppressed  or  discon- 
tented. Happy,  healthy  and  jolly  are 
the  words  by  which  they  would  be  most 
truthfully  described.  Still,  they  are  lazy, 
and  slow  to  appreciate  any  benefit  from 
civilization  except  the  money,  but  then 
savages  always  seem  to  me  as  keen  and 
sordid  about  money  as  the  most  civilized 
mercantile  community  anywhere. 

FEBRUARY  14. 

I  am  often  asked  by  people  who  are 
thinking  of  coming  here,  or  who  want  to 
send  presents  to  friends  here,  what  to 
bring  or  send.  Of  course  it  is  difficult 
to  say,  because  my  experience  is  limit- 
ed and  confined  to  one  spot  at  present : 
therefore  I  give  my  opinion  very  guarded- 
ly, and  acknowledge  it  is  derived  in  great 
part  from  the  experience  of  others  who 
have  been  here  a  long  time.  Amongst 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


other  wraps,  I  brought  a  sealskin  jacket 
and  muff  which  I  happened  to  have. 
These,  I  am  assured,  will  be  absolutely 
useless,  and  already  they  are  a  great 
anxiety  to  me  on  account  of  the  swarms 
of  fish-tail  moths  which  I  see  scuttling 
about  in  every  direction  if  I  move  a  box 
or  look  behind  a  picture.  In  fact,  there 
are  destructive  moths  everywhere,  and 
every  drawer  is  redolent  of  camphor. 
The  only  things  I  can  venture  to  recom- 
mend as  necessaries  are  things  which  no 
one  advised  me  to  bring,  and  which  were 
only  random  shots.  One  was  a  light 
waterproof  ulster,  and  the  other  was  a 
lot  of  those  outside  blinds  for  windows 
which  come,  I  believe,  from  Japan,  and 
are  made  of  grass — green,  painted  with 
gay  figures.  I  picked  up  these  latter  by 
the  merest  accident  at  the  Baker-street 
bazaar  for  a  few  shillings :  they  are  the 
comfort  of  my  life,  keeping  out  glare  and 
dust  in  the  day  and  moths  and  insects  of 
all  kinds  at  night.  As  for  the  waterproof, 
I  do  not  know  what  I  should  have  done 

without  it ;  and  little  G 's  has  also 

been  most  useful.  It  is  the  necessary  of 
necessaries  here — a  real,  good  substan- 
tial waterproof.  A  man  cannot  do  bet- 
ter than  get  a  regular  military  water- 
proof which  will  cover  him  from  chin  to 
heel  on  horseback ;  and  even  waterproof 
hats  and  caps  are  a  comfort  in  this  trea- 
cherous summer  season, 'where  a  storm 
bursts  over  your  head  out  of  a  blue  dome 
of  sky,  and  drenches  you  even  whilst  the 
sun  is  shining  brightly. 

A  worse  climate  and  country  for  clothes 
of  every  kind  and  description  cannot  be 
imagined.  When  I  first  arrived  I  thought 
I  had  never  seen  such  ugly  toilettes  in 
all  my  life ;  and  I  should  have  been  less 
than  woman  (or  more — which  is  it  ?)  if  I 
had  not  derived  some  secret  satisfaction 
from  the  possession  of  at  least  prettier 
garments.  What  I  was  vain  of  in  my 
secret  heart  was  my  store  of  cotton 
gowns.  One  can't  very  well  wear  cot- 
ton gowns  in  London  ;  and,  as  I  am  par- 
ticularly fond  of  them,  I  indemnify  my- 
self for  going  abroad  by  rushing  wildly 
into  extensive  purchases  in  cambrics  and 
print  dresses.  They  are  so  pretty  and  so 
cheap,  and  when  charmingly  made,  as 


mine  were  (alas,  they  are  already  things 
of  the  past !),  nothing  can  be  so  satisfac- 
tory in  the  way  of  summer  country  garb. 
Well,  it  has  been  precisely  in  the  matter 
of  cotton  gowns  that  I  have  been  punish- 
ed for  my  vanity.  For  a  day  or  two  each 
gown  in  turn  looked  charming.  Then 
came  a  flounce  or  bordering  of  bright 
red  earth  on  the  lower  skirt  and  a  gen- 
eral impression  of  red  dust  and  dirt  all 
over  it.  That  was  after  a  drive  into  Ma- 
ritzburg  along  a  road  ploughed  up  by 
ox-wagons.  Still,  I  felt  no  uneasiness. 
What  is  a  cotton  gown  made  for  if  not  to 
be  washed  ?  Away  it  goes  to  the  wash  ! 
What  is  this  limp,  discolored  rag  which 
returns  to  me  iron-moulded,  blued  until 
it  is  nearly  black,  rough-dried,  starched 
in  patches,  with  the  fringe  of  red  earth 
only  more  firmly  fixed  than  before  ?  Be- 
hold my  favorite  ivory  cotton  !  My  white 
gowns  are  even  in  a  worse  plight,  for 
there  are  no  two  yards  of  them  the  same, 
and  the  grotesque  mixture  of  extreme 
yellowness,  extreme  blueness  and  a  per- 
vading tinge  of  the  red  mud  they  have 
been  washed  in  renders  them  a  piteous 
example  of  misplaced  confidence.  Other 
things  fare  rather  better — not  much — but 
my  poor  gowns  are  only  hopeless  wrecks, 
and  I  am  reduced  to  some  old  yachting 
dresses  of  ticking  and  serge.  The  price 
of  washing,  as  this  spoiling  process  is 
pleasantly  called,  is  enormous,  and  I  ex- 
haust my  faculties  in  devising  more  eco- 
nomical arrangements.  We  can't  wash 
at  home,  for  the  simple  reason  that  we 
have  no  water,  no  proper  appliances  of 
any  sort,  and  to  build  and  buy  such 
would  cost  a  small  fortune.  But  a  tall, 
white-aproned  Kafir,  with  a  badge  upon 
his  arm,  comes  now  at  daylight  every 
Monday  morning  and  takes  away  a  huge 
sackful  of  linen,  which  is  placed,  with 
sundry  pieces  of  soap  and  blue  in  its 
mouth,  all  ready  for  him.  He  brings  it 
back  in  the  afternoon  full  of  clean  and 
dry  linen,  for  which  he  receives  three 
shillings  and  sixpence.  But  this  is  only 
the  first  stage.  The  things  to  be  starched 
have  to  be  sorted  and  sent  to  one  wo- 
man, and  those  to  be  mangled  to  anoth- 
er, and  both  lots  have  to  be  fetched  home 
again  by  Tom  and  Jack.  (I  have  for- 


52 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


gotten  to  tell  you  that  Jack's  real  name, 
elicited  with  great  difficulty,  as  there  is  a 
click  somewhere  in  it,  is  "Umpashong- 
wana,"  whilst  the  pickle  Tom  is  known 
among  his  own  people  as  "  Umkabang- 
wana."  You  will  admit  that  our  substi- 
tutes for  these  five-syllabled  appellations 
are  easier  to  pronounce  in  a  hurry.  Jack 
is  a  favorite  name  :  I  know  half  a  dozen 
black  Jacks  myself.)  To  return,  however, 
to  the  washing.  I  spend  my  time  in  this 
uncertain  weather  watching  the  clouds 
on  the  days  when  the  clothes  are  to  come 
home,  for  it  would  be  altogether  too  great 
a  trial  if  one's  starched  garments,  borne 
aloft  on  Jack's  head,  were  to  be  caught 
in  a  thunder-shower.  If  the  washerwo- 
man takes  pains  with  anything,  it  is  with 
gentlemen's  shirts,  though  even  then  she 
insists  on  ironing  the  collars  into  strange 
and  fearful  shapes. 

Let  not  men  think,  however,  that  they 
have  it  all  their  own  way  in  the  matter 
of  clothes.  White  jackets  and  trousers 
are  commonly  worn  here  in  summer,  and 
it  is  very  soothing,  I  am  told,  to  try  to 
put  them  on  in  a  hurry  when  the  arms 
and  legs  are  firmly  glued  together  by 
several  pounds  of  starch.  Then  as  to 
boots  and  shoes :  they  get  so  mildewed 
if  laid  aside  for  even  a  few  days  as  to  be 
absolutely  offensive  ;  and  these,  with  hats, 
wear  out  at  the  most  astonishing  rate. 
The  sun  and  dust  and  rain  finish  up  the 
hats  in  less  than  no  time. 

But  I  have  not  done  with  my  clothes 
yet.  A  lady  must  keep  a  warm  dress 
and  jacket  close  at  hand  all  through 
the  most  broiling  summer  weather,  for  a 
couple  of  hours  will  bring  the  thermom- 
eter down  ten  or  twenty  degrees,  and 
I  have  often  been  gasping  in  a  white 
dressing-gown  at  noon  and  shivering 
in  a  serge  dress  at  three  o'clock  on  the 
same  day.  I  am  making  up  my  mind  that 
serge  and  ticking  are  likely  to  be  the 
most  useful  material  for  dresses,  and,  as 
one  must  have  something  very  cool  for 
these  burning  months,  tussore  or  foulard, 
which  get  themselves  better  washed  than 
my  poor  dear  cottons.  Silks  are  next  to 
useless — too  smart,  too  hot,  too  entirely 
out  of  place  in  such  a  life  as  this,  except 
perhaps  one  or  two  of  tried  principles, 


which  won't  spot  or  fade  or  misbehave 
themselves  in  any  way.  One  goes  out 
of  a  warm,  dry  afternoon  with  a  tulle 
veil  on  to  keep  off  the  flies,  or  a  feather 
in  one's  hat,  and  returns  with  the  one  a 
limp,  wet  rag  and  the  other  quite  out  of 
curl.  I  only  wish  any  milliner  could  see 
my  feathers  now  !  All  straight,  rigidly 
straight  as  a  carpenter's  rule,  and  tinged 
with  red  dust  besides.  As  for  tulle  or 
crepe-lisse  frilling,  or  any  of  those  soft 
pretty  adjuncts  to  a  simple  toilette,  they 
are  five  minutes'  wear — no  more,  I  sol- 
emnly declare. 

I  love  telling  a  story  against  myself, 
and  here  is  one.  In  spite  of  repeated 
experiences  of  the  injurious  effect  of  al- 
ternate damp  and  dust  upon  finery,  the 
old  Eve  is  occasionally  too  strong  for 
my  prudence,  and  I  can't  resist,  on  the 
rare  occasions  which  offer  themselves, 
the  temptation  of  wearing  pretty  things. 
Especially  weak  am  I  in  the  matter  of 
caps,  and  this  is  what  befell  me.  Im- 
agine a  lovely,  soft  summer  evening, 
broad  daylight,  though  it  is  half-past 
seven  (it  will  be  dark  directly,  however) : 
a  dinner-party  to  be  reached  a  couple  of 
miles  away.  The  little  open  carriage  is 
at  the  door,  and  into  this  I  step,  swath- 
ing my  gown  carefully  up  in  a  huge 
shawl.  This  precaution  is  especially 
necessary,  for  during  the  afternoon  there 
has  been  a  terrific  thunderstorm  and  a 
sudden  sharp  deluge  of  rain.  Besides  a 
swamp  or  two  to  be  ploughed  through  as 
best  we  may,  there  are  those  two  miles 
of  deep  red  muddy  road  full  of  ruts  and 
big  stones  and  pitfalls  of  all  sorts.  The 
drive  home  in  the  dark  will  be  nervous 
work,  but  now  in  daylight  let  us  enjoy 
whilst  we  may.  Of  course  I  ought  to 
have  taken  my  cap  in  a  box  or  bag,  or 
something  of  the  sort ;  but  that  seemed 
too  much  trouble,  especially  as  it  was  so 
small  it  needed  to  be  firmly  pinned  on 
in  its  place.  It  consisted  of  a  centre 
or  crown  of  white  crepe,  a  little  frill  of 
the  same,  and  a  close-fitting  wreath  of 
deep  red  feathers  all  round.  Very  neat 
and  tidy  it  looked  as  I  took  my  last 
glance  at  it  whilst  I  hastily  knotted  a 
light  black  lace  veil  over  my  head  by 
way  of  protection  during  my  drive  When 


LhTTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


53 


I  got  to  my  destination  there  was  no  look- 
ing-glass to  be  seen  anywhere,  no  maid, 
no  anything  or  anybody  to  warn  me. 
Into  the  dining-room  I  marched  in  hap- 
py unconsciousness  that  the  extreme 
dampness  of  the  evening  had  flattened 
the  crown  of  my  cap,  and  that  it  and  its 
frill  were  mere  unconsidered  limp  rags, 
whilst  the  unpretending  circlet  of  feath- 
ers had  started  into  undue  prominence, 
and  struck  straight  out  like  a  red  nimbus 
all  round  my  unconscious  head.  How 
my  fellow-guests  managed  to  keep  their 
countenances  I  cannot  tell.  I  am  cer- 
tain /  never  could  have  sat  opposite  to 
any  one  with  such  an  Ojibbeway  Indian's 
head-dress  on  without  giggling.  But  no 
one  gave  me  the  least  hint  of  my  mis- 
fortune, and  it  only  burst  upon  me  sud- 
denly when  I  returned  to  my  own  room 
and  my  own  glass.  Still,  there  was  a 
ray  of  hope  left :  it  might  have  been  the 
dampness  of  the  drive  home  which  had 
worked  me  this  woe.  I  rushed  into 

F 's  dressing-room  and  demanded 

quite  fiercely  whether  my  cap  had  been 
like  that  all  the  time. 

"Why,  yes,"  F admitted;  adding 

by  way  of  consolation,  "  In  fact,  it  is  a 
good  deal  subdued  now:  it  was  very 
wild  all  dinner-time.  I  can't  say  I  ad- 
mired it,  but  I  supposed  it  was  all  right." 

Did  ever  any  one  hear  such  shocking 
apathy  ?  In  answer  to  my  reproaches 
for  not  telling  me,  he  only  said,  "Why, 
what  could  you  have  done  with  it  if  you 
had  known  ?  Taken  it  off  and  put  it  in 
your  pocket,  or  what  ?" 

I  don't  know,  but  anything  would  have 
been  better  than  sitting  at  table  with  a 
thing  only  fit  for  a  May-Day  sweep  on 
one's  head.  It  makes  me  hot  and  angry 
with  myself  even  to  think  of  it  now. 

F 's  clothes  could  also  relate  some 

curious  experiences  which  they  have  had 
to  go  through,  not  only  at  the  hands  of 
his  washerwoman,  but  at  those  of  his 
temporary  valet,  Jack  (I  beg  his  pardon, 
Umpashongwana)  the  Zulu,  whose  zeal 
exceeds  anything  one  can  imagine.  For 
instance,  when  he  sets  to  work  to  brush 

F 's  clothes  of  a  morning  he  is  by  no 

means  content  to  brush  the  cloth  clothes. 
Oh  dear,  no !  He  brushes  the  socks, 


I  putting  each  carefully  on  his  hand  like  a 
glove  and  brushing  vigorously  away.  As 
they  are  necessarily  very  thin  socks  for 
this  hot  weather,  they  are  apt  to  melt 
away  entirely  under  the  process.  I  say 
nothing  of  his  blacking  the  boots  inside 
as  well  as  out,  or  of  his  laboriously  scrub- 
bing holes  in  a  serge  coat  with  a  scrub- 
bing-brush, for  these  are  errors  of  judg- 
ment dictated  by  a  kindly  heart.  But 
when  Jack  puts  a  saucepan  on  the  fire 
without  any  water  and  burns  holes  in  it, 
or  tries  whether  plates  and  dishes  can 
support  their  own  weight  in  the  air  with- 
out a  table  beneath  them,  then,  I  con- 
fess, my  patience  runs  short.  But  Jack' 
is  so  imperturbable,  so  perfectly  and 
genuinely  astonished  at  the  untoward 
result  of  his  experiments,  and  so  grieved 
that  the  inkosacasa  (I  have  not  an  idea 
how  the  word  ought  to  be  spelt)  should 
be  vexed,  that  I  am  obliged  to  leave  off 
shaking  my  head  at  him,  which  is  the 
only  way  I  have  of  expressing  my  dis- 
pleasure. He  keeps  on  saying,  "  Ja,  oui, 
yaas,"  alternately,  all  the  time,  and  I 
have  to  go  away  to  laugh. 

FEBRUARY  16. 

I  was  much  amused  the  other  day  at 
receiving  a  letter  of  introduction  from  a 
mutual  friend  in  England,  warmly  rec- 
ommending a  newly-arrived  bride  and 
bridegroom  to  my  acquaintance,  and 
especially  begging  me  to  take  pains  to 
introduce  the  new-comers  into  the  "best 
society."  To  appreciate  the  joke  thor- 
oughly you  must  understand  that  there 
is  no  society  here  at  all  —  absolutely 
none.  We  are  not  proud,  we  Maritz- 
burgians,  nor  are  we  inhospitable,  nor 
exclusive,  nor  unsociable.  Not  a  bit. 
We  are  as  anxious  as  any  community 
can  be  to  have  society  or  sociable  ga- 
therings, or  whatever  you  like  to  call 
the  way  people  manage  to  meet  togeth- 
er ;  but  circumstances  are  altogether  too 
strong  for  us,  and  we  all  in  turn  are  forced 
to  abandon  the  attempt  in  despair.  First 
of  all,  the  weather  is  against  us.  It  is 
maddeningly  uncertain,  and  the  best-ar- 
ranged entertainment  cannot  be  consid- 
ered a  success  if  the  guests  have  to  strug- 
gle through  rain  and  tempest  and  streets 


54 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


ankle-deep  in  water  and  pitchy  darkness 
to  assist  at  it.  People  are  hardly  likely 
to  make  themselves  pleasant  at  a  party 
when  their  return  home  through  storm 
and  darkness  is  on  their  minds  all  the 
time :  at  least,  I  know  7  cannot  do  so. 
But  the  weather  is  only  one  of  the  lets 
and  hinderances  to  society  in  Natal. 
We  are  all  exceedingly  poor,  and  neces- 
sary food  is  very  dear :  luxuries  are  en- 
ormously expensive,  but  they  are  gen- 
erally not  to  be  had  at  all,  so  one  is  not 
tempted  by  them.  Servants,  particular- 
ly cooks,  are  few  and  far  between,  and  I 
doubt  if  even  any  one  calling  himself  a 
cook  could  send  up  what  would  be  con- 
sidered a  fairly  good  dish  elsewhere. 
Kafirs  can  be  taught  to  do  one  or  two 
things  pretty  well,  but  even  then  they 
could  not  be  trusted  to  do  them  for  a 
party.  In  fact,  if  I  stated  that  there 
were  no  good  servants — in  the  ordinary 
acceptation  of  the  word — here  at  all,  I 
should  not  be  guilty  of  exaggeration. 
If  there  are,  all  I  can  say  is,  I  have  nei- 
ther heard  of  nor  seen  them.  On  the 
contrary,  I  have  been  overwhelmed  by 
lamentations  on  that  score  in  which  I  can 
heartily  join.  Besides  the  want  of  means 
of  conveyance  (for  there  are  no  cabs,  and 
very  few  remises]  and  good  food  and  at- 
tendance, any  one  wanting  to  entertain 
would  almost  need  to  build  a  house,  so 
impossible  is  it  to  collect  more  than  half 
a  dozen  people  inside  an  ordinary-sized 
house  here.  For  my  part,  my  verandah 
is  the  comfort  of  my  life.  When  more 
than  four  or  five  people  at  a  time  chance 
to  come  to  afternoon  tea,  we  overflow 
into  the  verandah.  It  runs  round  three 
sides  of  the  four  rooms  called  a  house, 
and  is  at  once  my  day-nursery,  my  lum- 
ber-room, my  summer-parlor,  my  place 
of  exercise — everything,  in  fact.  And  it 
is  an  incessant  occupation  to  train  the 
creepers  and  wage  war  against  the  legions 
of  brilliantly-colored  grasshoppers  which 
infest  and  devour  the  honeysuckles  and 
roses.  Never  was  there  such  a  place  for 
insects!  They  eat  up  everything  in  the 
kitchen-garden,  devour  every  leaf  off  my 
peach  and  orange  trees,  scarring  and 
spoiling  the  fruit  as  well.  It  is  no  com- 
fort whatever  that  they  are  wonderfully 


beautiful  creatures,  striped  and  ringed 
with  a  thousand  colors  in  a  thousand 
various  ways :  one  has  only  to  see  the 
riddled  appearance  of  every  leaf  and 
flower  to  harden  one's  heart.  Just  now 
they  have  cleared  off  every  blossom  out 
of  the  garden  except  my  zinnias,  which 
grow  magnificently  and  make  the  de- 
vastated flower-bed  still  gay  with  every 
hue  and  tint  a  zinnia  can  put  on — sal- 
mon-color, rose,  scarlet,  pink,  maroon, 
and  fifty  shades  besides.  On  the  veldt 
too  the  flowers  have  passed  by,  but  their 
place  is  taken  by  the  grasses,  which  are 
all  in  seed.  People  say  the  grass  is  rank 
and  poor,  and  of  not  much  account  as 
food  for  stock,  but  it  has  an  astonishing 
variety  of  beautiful  seeds.  In  one  patch 
it  is  like  miniature  pampas-grass,  only  a 
couple  of  inches  long  each  seed-pod,  out 
white  and  fluffy.  Again,  there  will  be 
tall  stems  laden  with  rich  purple  grains  or 
delicate  tufts  of  rose-colored  seed.  One 
of  the  prettiest,  however,  is  like  wee 
green  harebells  hanging  all  down  a  tall 
and  slender  stalk,  and  hiding  within  their 
cups  the  seed.  Unfortunately,  the  weeds 
and  burs  seed  just  as  freely,  and  there  is 
one  especial  torment  to  the  garden  in  the 
shape  of  an  innocent-looking  little  plant 
something  like  an  alpine  strawberry  in 
leaf  and  blossom,  bearing  a  most  aggra- 
vating tuft  of  little  black  spines  which 
lose  no  opportunity  of  sticking  to  one's 
petticoats  in  myriads.  They  are  famil- 
iarly known  as  "blackjacks,"  and  can 
hold  their  own  as  pests  with  any  weed 
of  my  acquaintance. 

But  the  most  beautiful  tree  I  have  seen 
in  Natal  was  an  Acacia  flamboyante.  I 
saw  it  at  D'Urban,  and  I  shall  never  for- 
get the  contrast  of  its  vivid  green,  bright 
as  the  spring  foliage  of  a  young  oak,  and 
the  crown  of  rich  crimson  flowers  on  its 
topmost  branches,  tossing  their  brilliant 
blossoms  against  a  background  of  gleam- 
ing sea  and  sky.  It  was  really  splendid, 
like  a  bit  of  Italian  coloring  among  the 
sombre  tangle  of  tropical  verdure.  It  is 
too  cold  up  here  for  this  glorious  tree, 
which  properly  belongs  to  a  far  more 
tropical  temperature  than  even  D'Urban 
can  mount  up  to. 

I  am  looking  forward  to  next  month 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


55 


and  the  following  ones  to  make  some 
little  excursions  into  the  country,  or  to 
go  "trekking,"  as  the  local  expression  is. 
I  hear  on  all  sides  how  much  that  is  in- 
teresting lies  a  little  way  beyond  the 
reach  of  a  ride,  but  it  is  difficult  for  the 
mistress — who  is  at  the  same  time  the 
general  servant — of  an  establishment  out 
here  to  get  away  from  home  for  even  a  few 
days,  especially  when  there  is  a  couple 
of  small  children  to  be  left  behind.  No 


one  travels  now  who  can  possibly  help 
it,  for  the  sudden  violent  rains  which 
come  down  nearly  every  afternoon  swell 
the  rivers  and  make  even  the  spruits  im- 
passable ;  so  a  traveler  may  be  detained 
for  days  within  a  few  miles  of  his  desti- 
nation. Now,  in  winter  the  roads  will 
be  hard,  and  dust  will  be  the  only  in- 
convenience. At  least,  that  is  what  I 
am  promised. 


"VX. 


MARITZBURG,  March  5,  1876. 

I  DON'T  think  I  like  a  climate  which 
produces  a  thunderstorm  every  after- 
noon. One  disadvantage  of  this  electric 
excitement  is  that  I  hardly  ever  get  out 
for  a  walk  or  drive.  All  day  it  is  burn- 
ing hot :  if  there  is  a  breath  of  air,  it  is 
sultry,  and  adds  to  the  oppression  of  the 
atmosphere  instead  of  refreshing  it.  Then 
about  midday  great  fleecy  banks  of  cloud 
begin  to  steal  up  behind  the  ridge  of  hills 
to  the  south-west.  Gradually  they  creep 
round  the  horizon,  stretching  their  sort 
gray  folds  farther  and  farther  to  every 
point  of  the  compass,  until  they  have 
shrouded  the  dazzling  blue  sky  and  drop- 
ped a  cool,  filmy  veil  of  mist  between  the 
sun's  fierce,  steady  blaze  and  the  baked 
earth  below.  That  is  always  my  nervous 

moment.     F declares  I  am  exactly 

like  an  old  hen  with  her  chickens ;  and 
I  acknowledge  that  I  should  like  to  cluck 
and  call  everything  and  everybody  into 

shelter  and  safety.     If  little  G is  out 

on  his  pony  alone,  as  is  generally  the 
case — for  he  returns  from  school  early  in 
the  afternoon  —  and  I  think  of  the  great 
open  veldt,  the  rough,  broken  track  and 
the  treacherous  swamp,  what  wonder  is 
it  that  I  cannot  rest  in-doors,  but  am 
always  making  bareheaded  expeditions 
every  five  minutes  to  the  brow  of  the 
hill  to  see  if  I  can  discern  the  tiny  figure 
tearing  along  the  open,  with  its  floating 
white  puggery  streaming  behind  ?  The 
pony  may  safely  be  trusted  not  to  loiter, 
for  horse  and  cow,  bird  and  beast,  know 
what  that  rapidly  -  darkening  shadow 
means,  and  what  sudden  death  lurks 
within  those  patches  of  inky  clouds,  from 
which  a  deep  and  rolling  murmur  comes 
from  time  to  time.  I  am  uneasy  even  if 

F has  not  returned,  for  the  little  riv- 

er^  the  noisy  Umsindusi,  thinks  nothing 
of  suddenly  spreading  itself  far  and  wide 
over  its  banks,  turning  the  low -lying 
ground  into  a  lake  for  miles. 

It  is  true  that  this  may  only  last  for 


a  few  hours,  or  even  moments,  but  five 
minutes  is  quite  enough  to  do  a  great 
deal  of  mischief  when  a  river  is  rising  at 
the  rate  of  two  feet  a  minute — mischief 
not  only  to  human  beings,  but  to  bridges, 
roads  and  drains,  as  well  as  plantations 
and  fields.  Yet  that  tropical  downpour, 
where  the  clouds  let  loose  the  imprison- 
ed moisture  suddenly  in  solid  sheets  of 
water  instead  of  by  the  more  slow  and 
civilized  method  of  drops,  is  a  relief  to 
my  mind,  for  there  are  worse  possibilities 
than  a  wet  jacket  behind  those  lurid, 
low -hanging  vapors.  There  are  hail- 
storms, like  one  yesterday  morning  which 
rattled  on  the  red  tile  roof  like  a  dis- 
charge of  musketry,  and  with  nearly  as 
damaging  an  effect,  for  several  tiles  were 
broken  and  tumbled  down,  leaving  mel- 
ancholy gaps,  like  missing  teeth,  in  the 
eaves.  There  are  thunderbolts,  which 
strike  the  tallest  trees,  leaving  them  in 
an  instant  gaunt  and  bare  and  shriveled, 
as  though  centuries  had  suddenly  pass- 
ed over  their  green  and  waving  heads. 
There  are  flashes  of  lightning  which  dart 
through  a  verandah  or  room,  and  leave 
every  living  thing  in  it  struck  down  dead 
— peals  of  thunder  wHich  seem  to  shake 
the  very  earth  to  its  centre.  There  are 
all  these  meteorological  possibilities  — 
nay,  probabilities  —  following  fast  upon 
a  burning,  hot,  still  morning;  and  what 
wonder  is  it  that  I  am  anxious  and  ner- 
vous until  everybody  belonging  to  me  is 
under  shelter,  though  shelter  can  only 
be  from  the  driving  rain  or  tearing  gusts 
of  wind  ?  No  wall  or  window,  no  bolt 
or  bar,  can  keep  out  the  dazzling  death 
which  swoops  down  in  a  violet  glare  and 
snatches  its  victims  anywhere  and  every- 
where. A  Kafir  washerman,  talking  yes- 
terday morning  to  his  employer  in  her 
verandah,  was  in  the  act  of  saying,  "  I 
will  be  sure  to  come  to-morrow,"  when 
he  fell  forward  on  his  face,  dead  from  a 
blinding  flash  out  of  a  passing  thunder- 
cloud. An  old  settler,  a  little  way  up- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


57 


country,  was  reading  prayers  to  his  house- 
hold the  other  night,  and  in  a  second 
half  the  little  kneeling  circle  were  struck 
dead  alongside  of  the  patriarchal  reader 
— dead  on  their  knees.  Two  young  men 
were  playing  a  game  of  billiards  quiet- 
ly enough :  one  was  leaning  forward  to 
make  a  stroke  when  there  came  a  crash 
and  a  crackle,  and  he  dropped  dead  with 
his  cue  in  his  hand.  The  local  papers 
are  full  every  day  of  a  long  list  of  cas- 
ualties, but  it  is  not  from  these  sources 
I  have  drawn  the  preceding  examples  :  I 
only  chanced  to  hear  them  yesterday, 
and  they  all  happened  quite  close  by. 
As  for  cattle  or  trees  being  killed,  that 
is  an  every-day  occurrence  in  summer, 
and  even  a  hailstorm,  so  long  as  it  does 
not  utterly  bombard  the  town  and  leave 
the  houses  roofless  and  open  to  wind  and 
weather,  is  not  thought  anything  of.  The 
hail -shower  of  yesterday,  though,  bom- 
barded my  creepers  and  reduced  them 
to  a  pitiful  state  in  five  minutes.  So  soon 
as  it  was  possible  to  venture  outside  the 

house,  F called  me  to. see  the  ruin 

of  leaf  and  bud  which  strewed  the  ce- 
mented floor  of  the  verandah.  It  is  dif- 
ficult to  describe,  and  still  more  difficult 
to  believe,  the  state  to  which  the  foliage 
had  been  reduced.  On  the  weather  side 
of  the  house  every  leaf  was  torn  off,  and 
not  only  torn,  but  riddled  through  and 
through  as  though  by  a  charge  of  swan- 
shot.  All  my  young  rose-shoots,  climb- 
ing so  swiftly  up  to  the  roof  of  the  ve- 
randah, were  snapped  off  and  stripped 
of  their  tender  leaves  and  pretty  buds. 
The  honeysuckles'  luxuriant  foliage  was 
all  gone,  lying  in  a  wet,  forlorn  mass  of 
beaten  green  leaves  around  each  pillar, 
and  there  was  not  a  leaf  left  on  the  vines. 
But  a  much  more  serious  trouble  came 
out  of  that  storm.  Though  it  has  passed 
with  the  passing  fury  of  wind  and  rain, 
still,  it  will  always  leave  a  feeling  of  in- 
security in  my  mind  during  similar  out- 
bursts. The  great  hailstones  were  forced 
by  the  driving  wind  in  immense  quanti- 
ties beneath  the  tiles,  and  deposited  on 
the  rude  planking  which,  painted  white, 
forms  the  ceiling.  This  planking  has  the . 
boards  wide  apart,  so  it  is  not  difficult  to 
see  that  so  soon  as  the  warmth  of  the 


house  melted  the  hailstones  —  that  is,  in 
five  minutes — the  water  trickled  down  as 
through  a  sieve.  It  was  not  to  be  dealt 
with  like  an  ordinary  leak  :  it  was  here, 
there  and  everywhere,  on  sofas  and  chairs, 
beds  and  writing-tables ;  and  the  moment 
the  sun  shone  out  again,  bright  and  hot 
as  ever,  the  contents  of  the  house  had 
to  be  turned  out  of  doors  to  dry.  Dry- 
ing meant,  however,  warping  of  writing- 
tables,  and  in  fact  of  all  woodwork,  and 
fading  of  chintzes,  beneath  the  broiling 
glare  of  a  midday  sun.  Such  are  a  few 
of  the  difficulties  of  existence  in  South 
Africa — difficulties,  however,  which  must 
be  met  and  got  over  as  best  they  may, 
and  laughed  at  once  they  are  past  and 
over,  as  I  am  really  doing  in  spite  of  my 
affectation  of  grumbling. 

A  very  pleasant  adventure  came  to  us 
the  other  evening,  however,  through  one 
of  these  sudden  thunderstorms.  Imag- 
ine a  little  tea-table,  with  straw  chairs  all 
around  it,  standing  in  the  verandah.  A 
fair  and  pleasant  view  lies  before  us  of 
green  rises  and  still  greener  hollows,  with 
dark  dots  of  plantations  from  which  peep 
red  roofs  or  white  gables.  Beyond,  again, 
lies  Maritzburg  under  the  lee  of  higher 
hills,  which  cast  a  deeper  shadow  over 
the  picturesque  little  town.  We  are  six 
in  all,  and  four  horses  are  being  led  up 
and  down  by  Kafir  grooms,  for  their 
riders  have  come  out  for  a  breath  of  air 
after  a  long,  burning  day  of  semi-trop- 
ical heat,  and  also  for  a  cup  of  tea  and 
a  chat.  We  were  exactly  even,  three 
ladies  and  three  gentlemen ;  and  we 
grumbled  at  the  weather  and  complain- 
ed of  our  servants  according  to  the  usual 
style  of  South-African  conversation. 

Presently,  some  one  said,  "It's  much 
cooler  now." 

"Yes,"  was  the  answer,  "but  look  at 
those  clouds  ;  and  is  that  a  river  rolling 
down  the  hillside  ?" 

Up  to  that  moment  there  had  not  been 
a  drop  of  rain,  but  even  as  the  words 
passed  the  speaker's  lips  a  blinding  flash 
of  light,  a  sullen  growl  and  a  warning 
drop  of  rain,  making  a  splash  as  big  as 
half  a  crown  at  our  feet,  told  their  own 
story.  In  less  time  than  it  takes  me  to 
write  or  you  tjo  read  the  horses  had  been 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


hastily  led  up  to  the  stable  and  stuffed 
into  stalls  only  meant  for  two,  and  al- 
ready occupied.  But  Natalian  horses 
are  generally  meek,  underbred,  spirit- 
less creatures, '  with  sense  enough  to 
munch  their  mealies  in  peace  and  quiet, 
no  matter  how  closely  they  are  packed. 
As  for  me,  I  snatched  up  my  tea-tray 
and  fled  into  the  wee  drawing-room. 
Some  one  else  caught  up  the  table ; 
the  straw  chairs  were  left  as  usual  to 
be  buffeted  by  the  wind  and  weather, 
and  we  retreated  to  the  comparative 
shelter  of  the  house.  But  no  doors  or 
windows  could  keep  out  the  torrent  of 
rain  which  burst  like  a  waterspout  over 
our  heads,  forcing  its  way  under  the 
tiles,  beneath  the  badly -fitting  doors 
and  windows,  sweeping  and  eddying  all 
around  like  the  true  tropical  tempest  it 
was.  Claps  of  thunder  shook  the  nur- 
sery, where  we  three  ladies  had  taken 
refuge,  ostensibly  to  encourage  and  cheer 
the  nurse,  but  really  to  huddle  together 
like  sheep  with  the  children  in  our  midst. 
Flash  after  flash  lit  up  the  fast-gathering 
darkness  as  the  storm  rolled  away,  to 
end  in  an  hour  or  so  as  suddenly  as  it 
began.  By  this  time  it  was  not  much 
past  six,  and  though  the  twilight  is 
early  in  these  parts,  there  was  enough 
daylight  still  left  for  our  guests  to  see 
their  way  home.  So  the  horses  were 
brought,  adieux  were  made,  and  our 
guests  set  forth,  to  return,  however,  in 
half  an  hour  asking  whether  there  was 
any  other  road  into  town,  for  the  river 
was  sweeping  like  a  maelstrom  for  half 
a  mile  on  either  side  of  the  frail  wooden 
bridge  by  which  they  had  crossed  a 
couple  of  hours  earlier.  Now,  the  only 
other  road  into  town  is  across  a  ford,  or 
"drift,"  as  it  is  called  here,  of  the  same 
river  a  mile  higher  up.  Of  course,  it 
was  of  no  use  thinking  of  this  way  for 
even  a  moment ;  but  as  they  were 
really  anxious  to  get  home  if  possible, 

F volunteered  to  go  back  and  see  if 

it  was  practicable  to  get  across  by  the 
bridge.  I  listened  and  waited  anxiously 
enough  in  the  verandah,  for  I  could  hear 
the  roar  of  the  rushing  river  down  below 
— a  river  which  is  ordinarily  as  sluggish 
as  a  brook  in  midsummer — and  I  was 


so  afraid  that  F or  one  of  the  other 

gentlemen  would  rashly  venture  across. 
But  it  was  not  to  be  attempted  by  any 
one  who  valued  his  life  that  evening, 

and  F returned  joyously,  bringing 

our  guests  home  as  captives.  It  was 
great  fun,  for,  in  true  colonial  fashion, 
we  had  no  servants  to  speak  of  except 
the  nurse,  the  rest  being  Kafirs,  one  more 
ignorant  than  the  other.  And  fancy 
stowing  four  extra  people  into  a  house 
with  four  rooms  already  full  to  overflow- 
ing !  But  it  was  done,  and  done  success- 
fully too,  amid  peals  of  laughter  and 
absurd  contrivances  and  arrangements, 
reminding  us  of  the  dear  old  New  Zea- 
land days. 

The  triumph  of  condensation  was  due, 
however,  to  Charlie,  the  Kafir  groom, 
who  ruthlessly  turned  my  poor  little 
pony  carriage  out  into  the  open  air  to 
make  room  for  some  of  his  extra  horses, 
saying,  "  It  wash  it,  ma' — make  it  clean  : 
carriage  no  can  get  horse-sickness."  And 
he  was  right,  for  it  is  certain  death  to  turn 
a  horse  unaccustomed  to  the  open  out  of 
his  stable  at  night,  especially  at  this  time 
of  year.  We  were  all  up  very  early  next 
morning,  and  I  had  an  anxious  moment 
or  two  until  I  knew  whether  my  market- 
Kafir  could  get  out  to  me  with  bread, 
etc.;  but  soon  after  seven  I  saw  him 
trudging  gayly  along  with  his  bare  legs, 
red  tunic  and  long  wand  or  stick,  with- 
out which  no  Kafir  stirs  a  yard  away 
from  home.  Apropos  of  that  red  tunic, 
it  was  bought  and  given  to  him  to  pre- 
vent him  from  wearing  the  small  piece 
of  waterproof  canvas  I  gave  him  to  wrap 
up  my  bread,  flour,  sugar,  etc.  in  on  a 
wet  morning.  I  used  to  notice  that  these 
perishable  commodities  arrived  as  often 
quite  sopped  through  and  spoiled  after 
this  arrangement  about  the  waterproof  as 
before,  but  the  mystery  was  solved  by 
seeing  "Ufan"  (otherwise  John)  with  my 
basket  poised  on  his  head,  the  rain  pelt- 
ing down  upon  its  contents,  and  the  small 
square  of  waterproof  tied  with  a  string  at 
each  corner  over  his  own  back.  That 
reminds  me  of  a  hat  I  saw  worn  in  Ma- 
•  ritzburg  two  days  ago  in  surely  the  most 
eccentric  fashion  hat  was  ever  yet  put 
on.  It  was  a  large,  soft  gray  felt,  and. 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


59 


as  far  as  I  could  judge,  in  pretty  good 
condition.  The  Kafir  who  sported  it  had 
fastened  a  stout  rope  to  the  brim,  at  the 
extreme  edge  of  the  two  sides.  He  had 
then  turned  the  hat  upside  down,  and 
wore  it  thus  securely  moored  by  these 
ropes  behind  his  ears  and  under  his  chin. 
There  were  sundry  trifles  of  polished 
bone,  skewers  and  feathers  stuck  about 
his  head  as  well,  but  the  inverted  hat 
sat  serenely  on  the  top  of  all,  the  soft 
crown  being  further  secured  to  its  own- 
er's woolly  pate  by  soda-water  wire.  I 
never  saw  anything  so  absurd  in  my  life ; 
but  Charlie,  who  was  holding  my  horse, 
gazed  at  it  with  rapture,  and  putting  both 
hands  together  murmured  in  his  best 
English  and  in  the  most  insinuating 
manner,  "  Inkosi  have  old  hat,  ma'  ? 
Like  dat?"  He  evidently  meant  to 
imitate  the  fashion  if  he  could. 

Poor  Charlie  has  lost  his  savings — 
three  pounds.  He  has  been  in  great 
trouble  about  it,  as  he  was  saving  up  his 
money  carefully  to  buy  a  wife.  It  has 
been  stolen,  I  fear,  by  one  of  his  fellow- 
servants,  and  suspicion  points  strongly 
to  Tom  the  Pickle,  who  cannot  be  made 
to  respect  the  rights  of  property  in  any 
shape,  from  my  sugar  upward.  The  ma- 
chinery of  the  law  has  been  set  in  mo- 
tion to  find  these  three  pounds,  with  no 
good  results,  however ;  and  now  Charlie 
avows  his  intention  of  bringing  a  "witch- 
finder"  (that  is,  a  witch  who  finds)  up 
to  tell  him  where  the  money  is.  I  am 
invited  to  be  present  at  the  performance, 
but  I  only  hope  she  won't  say  /have  got 
poor  Charlie's  money,  for  the  etiquette 
is  that  whoever  she  accuses  has  to  pro- 
duce the  missing  sum  at  once,  no  mat- 
ter whether  he  knows  anything  about  its 
disappearance  or  not. 

Before  I  quite  leave  the  subject  of 
thunderstorms  —  of  which  I  devoutly 
hope  this  is  the  last  month — I  must  ob- 
serve that  it  seems  a  cruel  arrangement 
that  the  only  available  material  for  met- 
aling the  roads  should  be  iron-stone,  of 
which  there  is  an  immense  quantity  in 
the  immediate  neighborho.od  of  Maritz- 
burg.  It  answers  the  purpose  admirably 
so  far  as  changing  the  dismal  swamps 
of  the  streets  into  tolerably  hard  high- 


roads goes ;  but  in  such  an  electric  cli- 
mate as  this  it  is  really  very  dangerous. 
Since  the  principal  street  has  been  thus 
improved,  I  am  assured  that  during  a 
thunderstorm  it  is  exceedingly  danger- 
ous to  pass  down  it.  Several  oxen  and 
Kafirs  have  been  struck  down  in  it,  ami 
the  lightning  seems  to  be  attracted  to  the 
ground,  and  runs  along  it  in  lambent 
sheets  of  flame.  Yet  I  fancy  it  is  a  case 
of  iron-stone  or  nothing,  for  the  only 
other  stone  I  see  is  a  flaky  substance 
which  is  very  friable  and  closely  resem- 
bles slate,  and  would  be  perfectly  un- 
manageable for  road-making  purposes. 

Speaking  of  roads,  I  only  wish  any- 
body who  grumbles  at  rates  and  taxes, 
which  at  all  events  keep  him  supplied 
with  water  and  roads,  could  come  here 
for  a  month.  First,  he  should  see  the 
red  mud  in  scanty  quantities  which  repre- 
sents our  available  water-supply  (except 
actually  in  the  town) ;  and  next  he  should 
walk  or  ride  or  drive— for  each  is  equal- 
ly perilous — down  to  the  town,  a  mile  or 
two  off,  with  me  of  a  dark  night.  I  say, 
"with  me,"  because  I  should  make  it  a 
point  to  call  the  grumbler's  attention  to 
the  various  pitfalls  on  the  way.  I  think 
I  should  like  him  to  drive  about  seven 
o'clock,  say  to  dinner,  when  one  does 
not  like  the  idea  of  having  to  struggle 
with  a  broken  carriage  or  to  go  the  re- 
mainder of  the  way  on  foot.  About  7 
p.  M.  the  light  is  peculiarly  treacherous 
and  uncertain,  and  is  worse  than  the 
darkness  later  on.  Very  well,  then,  we 
will  start,  first  looking  carefully  to  the 
harness,  lest  Charlie  should  have  omit- 
ted to  fasten  some  important  strap  or 
buckle.  There  is  a  track — in  fact,  there 
are  three  tracks — all  the  way  down  to  the 
main  road,  but  each  track  has  its  own 
dangers.  Down  the  centre  of  one  runs 
a  ridge  like  a  backbone,  with  a  deep  furrow 
on  either  hand.  If  we  were  to  attempt 
this,  the  bed  of  the  pony  carriage  would 
rest  on  the  ridge,  to  the  speedy  destruc- 
tion of  the  axles.  To  the  right  there  is 
a  grassy  track,  which  is  as  uneven  as  a 
ploughed  field,  and  has  a  couple  of  tre- 
mendous holes,  to  begin  with,  entirely 
concealed  by  waving  grass.  The  secret 
of  these  constant  holes  is  that  a  noctur- 


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LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


nal  animal  called  an  ant-bear  makes 
raids  upon  the  ant-hills,  which  are  like 
mole-hills,  only  bigger,  destroys  them, 
and  scoops  down  to  the  new  foundation 
in  its  search  for  the  eggs,  an  especial 
dainty  hard  to  get  at.  So  one  day  there 
is  a  little  brown  hillock  to  be  seen  among 
the  grass,  and  the  next  only  a  scratched- 
up  hole.  The  tiny  city  is  destroyed,  the 
fortress  taken  and  razed  to  the  ground. 
All  the  ingenious  galleries  and  large 
halls  are  laid  low  and  the  precious  nur- 
series crumbled  to  the  dust.  If  we  get 
into  one  of  these,  we  shall  go  no  farther 
(a  horse  broke  his  neck  in  one  last  week). 
But  we  will  suppose  them  safely  passed  ; 
and  also  the  swamp.  To  avoid  this  we 
must  take  a  good  sweep  to  the  left  over  per- 
fectly unknown  ground,  and  we  shall  be 
sure  to  disturb  a  good  many  Kafir  cranes 
— birds  who  are  so  ludicrously  like  the 
black-headed,  red-legged,  white-bodied 
cranes  in  a  "  Noah's  ark  "  that  they  seem 
old  friends  at  once.  Now,  there  is  one 
deep,  deep  ravine  right  across  the  road, 
and  then  a  steep  hill,  halfway  down  which 
comes  a  very  pretty  bit  of  driving  in 
doubtful  light.  You've  got  to  tura  ab- 
ruptly to  the  left  on  the  shoulder  of  the 
hill.  Exactly  where  you  turn  is  a  cre- 
vasse of  unknown  depth,  originally  some 
sort  of  rude  drain.  The  rains  have  wash- 
ed away  the  hoarding,  made  havoc  around 
the  drain,  and  left  a  hole  which  it  is  not 
pleasant  to  look  into  on  foot  and  in  broad 
daylight.  But,  whatever  you  do,  don't, 
in  trying  to  avoid  this  hole,  keep  too 
much  to  the  right,  for  there  is  what  was 
once  intended  for  a  reasonable  ditch,  but 
furious  torrents  of  water  racing  along 
have  seized  upon  it  as  a  channel  and 
turned  it  into  a  river-course.  After  that, 
at  the  foot  of  the  hill,  lies  a  quarter  of  a 
mile  of  mud  and  heavy  sand,  with  alter- 
nate big  projecting  boulders  and  deep 
holes  made  by  unhappy  wagons  having 
stuck  therein.  Then  you  reach — always 
supposing  you  have  not  yet  broken  a 
spring — the  willow  bridge,  a  little  frail 
wooden  structure,  prettily  shaded  and 
sheltered  by  luxuriant  weeping  willows 
drooping  their  trailing  green  plumes  into 
the  muddy  Umsindusi ;  and  so  on  to  the 
main  road  into  Pieter-Maritzburg.  Such 


a  bit  of  road  as  this  is  !  It  ought  to  be 
photographed.  I  suppose  it  is  a  couple 
of  dozen  yards  wide  (for  land  is  of  little 
value  hereabouts,  and  we  can  afford  wide 
margins  to  our  highways),  and  there  cer- 
tainly is  not  more  than  a  strip  a  yard 
wide  which  is  anything  like  safe  driving. 
In  two  or  three  places  it  is  deeply  furrow- 
ed for  fifty  yards  or  so  by\he  heavy  sum- 
mer rains.  Here  and  there  are  standing 
pools  of  water  in  holes  whose  depth  is 
unknown,  and  everywhere  the  surface  is 
deeply  seamed  and  scarred  by  wagon- 
wheels.  Fortunately  for  my  nerves,  there 
are  but  few  and  rare  occasions  on  which 
we  are  tempted  to  confront  these  perils 
by  night,  and  hitherto  we  have  been  tol- 
erably fortunate. 

\  MARCH  10. 

You  will  think  this  letter  is  nothing  but 
a  jumble  of  grumbles  if,  after  complain- 
ing of  the  roads,  I  complain  of  my  hens  ; 
but,  really,  if  the  case  were  fairly  stated, 
I  am  quite  sure  that  Mr.  Tetmegeier  or 
any  of  the  great  authorities  on  poul- 
try-keeping would  consider  I  had  some 
ground  for  bemoaning  myself.  In  the 
first  place,  as  I  think  I  have  mentioned 
before,  there  is  a  sudden  and  mysterious 
disease  among  poultry  which  breaks  out 
like  an  epidemic,  and  is  vaguely  called 
"fowl-sickness."  That  possibility  alone 
is  an  anxiety  to  one,  and  naturally  makes 
the  poultry-fancier  desirous  of  rearing  as 
many  chickens  as  possible,  so  as  to  leave 
a  margin  for  disaster.  In  spite  of  all 
my  incessant  care  and  trouble,  and  a 
vast  expenditure  of  mealies,  to  say  noth- 
ing of  crusts  and  scraps,  I  only  manage 
to  rear  about  twenty-five  per  cent,  of  my 
chickens.  Even  this  is  accomplished  in 
the  face  of  such  unparalleled  stupidity  on 
the  part  of  my  hens  that  I  wonder  any 
chickens  survive  at  all.  Nothing  will 
induce  the  hens  to  avail  themselves  of 
any  sort  of  shelter  for  their  broods.  They 
just  squat  down  in  the  middle  of  a  path 
or  anywhere,  and  go  to  sleep  there.  I 
hear  sleepy  "squawks"  in  the  middle  of 
the  night,  and  find  next  morning  that 
a  cat  or  owl  or  snake  has  been  supping 
off  half  my  baby-chickens.  Besides  this 
sort  of  nocturnal  fatalism,  they  perpetrate 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


61 


wholesale  infanticide  during  the  day  by 
dragging  the  poor  little  wretches  about 
among  weeds  and  grass  five  feet  high, 
all  wet  and  full  of  thorns  and  burs.  But 
it  is  perhaps  in  the  hen-house  that  the 
worst  and  most  idiotic  part  of  their  nature 
shows  itself.  Some  few  weeks  ago  I  took 
three  hens  who  were  worrying  us  all  to 
death  by  clucking  entreaties  to  be  given 
eggs  to  sit  upon,  and  established  them  in 
three  empty  boxes,  with  seven  or  eight 
eggs  under  each.  What  do  you  think  these 
hens  have  done  ?  They  have  contrived, 
in  the  first  place,  to  push  and  roll  all  the 
eggs  into  one  nest.  Then  they  appear 
to  have  invited  every  laying  hen  in  the 
place  into  that  box,  for  I  counted  forty- 
eight  eggs  in  it  last  week.  Upon  these 
one  hen  sits,  in  the  very  centre.  Of 
course,  there  are  many  eggs  outside  her 
wings,  although  she  habitually  keeps 
every  feather  fluffed  out  to  the  utmost ; 
which  must  in  itself  be  a  fatigue.  Around 
her,  standing,  but  still  sitting  vigorously, 
were  three  other  hens  covering,  or  at- 
tempting to  cover,  this  enormous  nest- 
ful  of  eggs.  Every  now  and  then  they 
appear  to  give  a  party,  for  I  find  several 
eggs  kicked  out  into  the  middle  of  the 
hen-house,  and  strange  fowls  feeding  on 
them  amid  immense  cackling.  Nothing 
ever  seems  to  result  from  this  pyramid 
of  feathers.  It  (the  pyramid)  has  been 
there  just  five  weeks  now,  and  at  distant 
intervals  a  couple  of  chickens  have  ap- 
peared which  none  of  the  hens  will  ac- 
knowledge. Sitting  appears  to  be  their 
one  idea.  They  look  upon  chickens  as 
an  interruption  to  their  more  serious  du- 
ties, and  utterly  disregard  them.  It  is 
quite  heartbreaking  to  see  these  unhap- 
py chickens  seeking  for  a  mother,  and 
meeting  with  nothing  but  pecks  and 
squalls,  which  plainly  express,  "Go  along, 
do/"  One  hen  I  have  left,  as  advised, 
to  her  own  devices,  and  she  has  shown 
her  instinct  by  laying  ten  eggs  on  a  rafter 
over  the  stable,  upon  which  she  can  bare- 
ly balance  herself  and  them.  Upon  these 
eggs  she  is  now  sitting  with  great  dili- 
gence, but  as  each  chicken  is  hatched 
there  is  no  possible  fate  for  it  but  to 
tumble  off  the  rafter  and  be  killed. 
There  is  no  ladder  or  any  means  of  as- 


cent, or  of  descent  except  a  drop  of  a 
dozen  feet.  Another  hen  has  turned  a 
pigeon  off  her  nest,  and  insisted  on  sit- 
ting upon  the  two  eggs  herself.  Great 
was  her  dismay,  however,  when  she  found 
that  her  babies  required  to  be  fed  every 
five  minutes,  and  that  no  amount  of  peck- 
ing could  induce  them  to  come  out  for  a 
walk  the  day  they  Avere  hatched.  She 
deserted  them,  of  course,  and  the  poor 
little  pigeons  died  of  neglect.  Now,  do  you 
not  think  Kafir  hens  are  a  handful  for  a 
poor  woman,  who  has  quantities  of  other 
things  to  do,  to  have  to  manage  ? 

Part  of  my  regular  occupation  at  this 
time  of  year,  when  nearly  every  blade 
of  grass  carries  a  tick  at  its  extreme 
tip,  is  to  extract  these  pertinacious  little 
beasties  from  the  children's  legs  and 
arms.  I  can  understand  how  it  is  that 
G is  constantly  coming  to  me  say- 
ing, "A  needle,  mumsy,  if  you  please: 
here  is  such  a  big  tick !"  because  he  is 
always  in  the  grass  helping  Charlie  to 
stuff  what  he  has  cut  for  the  horses  into 
a  sack  or  assisting  some  one  else  to  burn 
a  large  patch  of  rank  vegetation,  and  dis- 
lodging snakes,  centipedes  and  all  sorts 
of  venomous  things  in  the  process, — I 
can  understand,  I  say,  how  this  mis- 
chievous little  imp,  who  is  always  in  the 
front  of  whatever  is  going  on,  should  ga- 
ther unto  himself  ticks,  mosquitoes,  ajid 
even  "fillies;"  but  I  cannot  comprehend 
why  the  baby,  who,  from  lack  of  physical 
possibilities,  leads  a  comparatively  harm- 
less and  innocent  existence,  should  also 
attract  ticks  to  his  fat  arms  and  legs.  I 
thought  perhaps  they  might  come  from 
a  certain  puppy  which  gets  a  good  deal 
of  hugging  up,  but  I  am  assured  that  a 
tick  never  leaves  an  animal.  They  will 
come  off  the  grass  upon  any  live  thing 
passing,  but  they  never  move  once  they 
have  taken  hold  of  flesh  with  their  cruel 
pincers.  It  is  quite  a  dreadful  thing  to 
see  the  oxen  "out-spanned"  when  they 
come  down  to  the  "spruit"  to  drink. 
Their  dewlaps,  and  indeed  their  whole 
bodies,  seem  a  mass  of  these  horrible, 
swollen,  bloated  insects,  as  big  as  a  large 
pea  already,  but  sucking  away  with  all 
their  might,  and  resisting  all  efforts  the 
unhappy  animals  can  make  with  tail  or 


62 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


head  to  get  rid  of  them.  Whenever  I 
see  the  baby  restless  and  fidgety,  I  un- 
dress him,  and  I  am  pretty  sure  to  find 
a  tick  or  two  lazily  moving  about  look- 
ing for  a  comfortable  place  to  settle. 

G gave  me  quite  a  fright  the  other 

day.  He  was  nicely  dressed,  for  a  won- 
der, to  go  for  a  drive  with  me  in  the  car- 
riage, and  was  standing  before  my  look- 
ing-glass attempting  to  brush  his  hair. 
Suddenly  I  saw  a  stream  of  blood  pour- 
ing down  his  neck,  and  on  examination 
I  found  that  he  must  have  dislodged  the 
great  bloated  tick  lying  on  his  collar,  and 
which  had  settled  on  a  vein  just  above 
his  ear.  The  creature  had  made  quite  a 
wound-  as  it  was  being  torn  away  by  the 
brush,  and  the  blood  was  pouring  free- 
ly from  it,  and  would  not  be  staunched. 
No  cold  water  or  plaster  or  anything 
would  stop  it,  and  the  end  was  that  poor 

little  G had  to  give  up  his  drive  and 

remain  at  home  with  wet  cloths  on  his 
head.  He  was  rather  proud  of  it,  all 
the  same,  considering  it  quite  an  adven- 
ture, especially  as  he  declared  it  did  not 
hurt  at  all.  Both  the  children  keep  very 
well  here,  although  they  do  not  look  so 
rosy  as  they  used  to  in  England;  but 
I  am  assured  that  the  apple-cheeks  will 
come  back  in  the  winter.  They  have 
enormous  appetites,  and  certainly  enjoy 
the  free,  unconventional  life  amazingly ; 
only  Baby  will  not  take  to  a  Kafir  nurse- 
boy.  He  condescends  to  smile  when 
Charlie  or  any  of  the  servants  (for  they 
all  pet  him  a  great  deal)  executes  a  war- 
dance  for  his  amusement  or  sings  him  a 
song,  but  he  does  not  like  being  carried 
about  in  their  arms.  I  have  now  got  a 
Kafir  nurse-girl,  a  Christian.  She  is  a 
fat,  good-tempered  and  very  docile  girl 
of  about  fifteen,  who  looks  at  least  twen- 
ty-five years  old.  Baby  only  goes  to  her 
to  pluck  off  the  gay  'kerchief  she  wears 
on  her  head.  When  that  is  removed  he 
shrieks  to  get  away  from  her. 

It  is  so  absurd  to  see  an  English  child 

falling  into  colonial  ways.     G talks 

to  all  the  animals  in  Kafir,  for  they  evi- 
dently don't  understand  English.  If  one 
wants  to  get  rid  of  a  dog,  it  is  of  no  use 
saying  "Get  out!"  ever  so  crossly;  but 
when  G yells  "Foot-sack!"  (this  is 


pure  phonetic  spelling,  out  of  my  own 
head)  the  cur  retreats  precipitately.  So 
to  a  horse :  you  must  tell  him  to  go  on 
in  Kafir,  and  he  will  not  stop  for  any 

sound  except  a  long  low  whistle.    G 

even  plays  at  games  of  the  country. 
Sometimes  I  come  upon  the  shady  side 
of  the  verandah,  taken  up  with  chairs 
arranged  in  pairs  along  all  its  length 
and  a  sort  of  tent  of  rugs  and  shawls  at 
one  end,  which  is  the  wagon.  "  I  am 
playing  at  trekking,  mumsy  dear:  would 
you  like  to  wait  and  see  me  out-span  ? 
There  is  a  nice  place  with  water  for  the 
bullocks,  and  wood  for  my  fire.  Look 
at  the  brake  of  my  wagon ;  and  here's 
such  a  jolly  real  bullock-whip  Charlie 
made  me  out  of  a  bamboo  and  strips  of 

bullock-hide."     G can't  believe  he 

ever  played  at  railways  or  horses  or  civ- 
ilized games,  and  it  is  very  certain  that 
the  baby  will  trek  and  out-span  so  soon 
as  he  can  toddle. 

We  grown  -  up  people  catch  violent 
colds  here ;  and  it  is  no  wonder,  con- 
sidering the  changes  of  weather,  far  be- 
yond what  even  you,  with  your  fickle 
climate,  have  to  bear.  Twenty  -  four 
hours  ago  it  was  so  cold  that  I  was  glad 
of  my  sealskin  jacket  at  six  o'clock  in 
the  evening,  and  it  was  really  bitterly 
cold  at  night.  The  next  morning  there 
was  a  hot  wind,  and  it  has  been  like 
living  at  the  mouth  of  a  furnace  ever 
since.  What  wonder  is  it  that  I  hear 
of  bronchitis  or  croup  in  almost  every 
house,  and  that  we  have  all  got  bad 
colds  in  our  throats  and  chests  ?  I  heard 
the  climate  defined  the  other  day  as  one 
in  which  sick  people  get  well,  and  well 
people  get  sick,  and  I  begin  to  think  it 
is  rather  a  true  way  of  looking  at  it. 
People  are  always  complaining,  and  the 
doctors  (of  whom  there  are  a  great  many 
in  proportion  to  the  population)  seem  al- 
ways very  busy.  Everybody  says,  "Wait 
till  the  winter,"  but  I  have  been  here 
four  months  now,  three  of  which  have 
certainly  been  the  most  trying  and  dis- 
agreeable, as  to  climate  and  weather,  I 
have  ever  experienced ;  nor  have  I  ever 
felt  more  generally  unhinged  and  unwell 
in  my  life.  This  seems  a  hard  thing  to 
say  of  a  climate  with  so  good  a  reputa- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


tion  as  this,  but  I  am  obliged  to  write  of 
things  as  I  find  them.  I  used  to  hear 
the  climate  immensely  praised  in  Eng- 
land, but  I  don't  hear  much  said  in  its 
favor  here.  The  most  encouraging  re- 
mark one  meets  with  is,  "Oh,  you'll  get 
used  to  it." 

HOWICK,  March  13. 

It  is  difficult  to  imagine  that  so  cool 
and  charming  a  spot  as  this  is  only  a 
dozen  miles  from  Maritzburg,  of  which 
one  gets  so  tired.  It  must  be  acknow- 
ledged that  each  mile  might  fairly  count 
for  six  English  ones  if  the  difficulty  of 
getting  over  it  were  reckoned.  The  jour- 
ney occupied  three  hours  of  a  really  beau- 
tiful afternoon,  which  had  the  first  crisp 
freshness  of  autumn  in  its  balmy  breath, 
and  the  road  climbed  a  series  of  hills, 
with,  from  the  top  of  each,  a  wide  and 
charming  prospect.  We  traveled  in  a 
sort  of  double  dog-cart  of  a  solidity  and 
strength  of  construction  which  filled  me 
with  amazement  until  I  saw  the  nature 
of  the  ground  it  had  to  go  over.  Then  I 
was  fain  to  confess  it  might  have  been — 
if  such  were  possible  —  twice  as  strong 
with  advantage,  for  in  spite  of  care  and 
an  exceeding  slow  pace  we  bent  our 
axles.  This  road  is  actually  the  first 
stage  of  the  great  overland  journey  to 
the  diamond-fields,  and  it  is  difficult  to 
imagine  how  there  can  be  any  transport 
service  at  all  in  the  face  of  such  difficul- 
ties. I  have  said  so  much  about  bad 
roads  already  that  I  feel  more  than  half 
ashamed  to  dilate  upon  this  one;  yet 
roads,  next  to  servants,  are  the  standing 
grievance  of  Natal.  To  see  a  road-party 
at  work  —  and  you  must  bear  in  mind 
that  thousands  are  spent  annually  on 
roads — is  to  understand  in  a  great  mea- 
sure how  so  many  miles  come  to  be 
mere  quagmires  and  pitfalls  for  man  and 
beast.  A  few  tents  by  the  roadside  here 
and  there,  a  little  group  of  lazy,  three- 
parts-naked  Kafirs,  a  white  man  in  com- 
mand who  probably  knows  as  little  of 
the  first  principles  of  roadmaking  as  his 
dog,  and  a  feeble  scratching  up  of  the 
surrounding  mud,  transferring  it  from 
one  hole  to  the  other, — that  is  roadmak- 
ing in  Natal,  so  far  as  it  has  presented 


itself  to  me.  On  this  particular  route  the 
fixed  idea  of  the  road-parties — of  which 
we  passed  three  —  was  to  dig  a  broad, 
wide  ditch  a  couple  of  feet  below  the 
level  of  the  surrounding  country,  and  to 
pick  up  the  earth  all  over  it,  so.  that  the 
first  shower  of  rain  might  turn  it  into  a 
hopeless,  sticky  mass  of  mud.  As  for 
any  idea  of  making  the  middle  of  the 
road  higher  than  the  sides,  that  appears 
to  be  considered  a  preposterous  one,  and 
is  not,  at  all  events,  acted  upon  in  any 
place  I  have  seen.  It  was  useless  to 
think  of  availing  ourselves  of  the  ditch, 
for  the  mud  looked  too  serious  after  last 
night's  heavy  rain  ;  so  we  kept  to  an  old- 
er track,  where  we  bumped  in  and  out  of 
holes  in  a  surprising  and  bruising  fash- 
ion. It  took  four  tolerably  stout  and 
large  horses  to  get  us  along  at  all ;  and 
if  they  had  not  been  steadily  and  care- 
fully driven,  we  should  have  been  still 
more  black  and  blue  and  stiff  and  aching 
than  we  were.  I  wonder  if  you  will  be- 
lieve me  when  I  say  that  I  was  assured 
that  many  of  the  holes  were  six  feet 
deep?  I  don't  think  our  wheels  went 
into  any  hole  more  than  three  feet  be- 
low the  rough  surface.  I  found,  how- 
ever, that  the  boulders  were  worse  than 
the  holes.  One  goes,  to  a  certain  extent, 
quietly  in  and  out  of  a  hole,  but  the 
wheel  slips  very  suddenly  off  the  top  of 
a  high  boulder,  and  comes  to  the  ground 
with  a  cruel  jerk.  There  was  plenty  of 
rock  in  the  hillside,  so  every  now  and 
then  the  holes  would  be  filled  up  by 
boulders,  and  we  crawled  for  some  yards 
over  ground  which  had  the  effect  of  an 
exceedingly  rough  wall  having  tumbled 
down  over  it.  If  one  could  imagine  Mr. 
MacAdam's  idea  carried  out  in  Brobding- 
nag,  one  would  have  some  faint  notion  of 
the  gigantic  proportions  of  the  hardening 
material  on  that  road. 

It  was — as  is  often  the  case  where  an 
almost  tropical  sun  draws  up  the  mois- 
ture from  the  earth — a  misty  evening, 
and  the  distant  view  was  too  vague  and 
vaporous  to  leave  any  distinct  picture  on 
my  memory.  Round  Howick  itself  are 
several  little  plantations  in  the  clefts  of 
the  nearest  downs,  and  each  plantation 
shelters  a  little  farm  or  homestead.  We 


64 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


can  only  just  discern  in  more  distant  hol- 
lows deep  blue-black  shadows  made  by 
patches  of  real  native  forest,  the  first  I 
have  seen  ;  but  close  at  hand  the  park- 
like  country  is  absolutely  bare  of  timber 
save  for  these  sheltering  groups  of  gum 
trees,  beneath  whose  protection  other 
trees  can  take  root  and  flourish.  Gum 
trees  seem  the  nurses  of  all  vegetation 
in  a  colony :  they  drain  a  marshy  soil 
and  make  it  fit  for  a  human  dwelling- 
place  wherever  they  grow.  There  you 
see  also  willows  with  their  delicate  ten- 
der leaves,  and  sentinel  poplars  whose 
lightly -poised  foliage  keeps  up  a  cool 
rustle  always.  But  now  the  road  is  get- 
ting a  trifle  better,  and  we  are  beginning 
to  drop  down  hill.  Hitherto  it  has  been 
all  stiff  collar-work,  and  we  have  climbed 
a  thousand  feet  or  more  above  Maritz- 
burg.  It  is  closing  in  quite  a  cold  even- 
ing, welcome  to  our  sun-baked  energies, 
as  we  drive  across  quite  an  imposing 
bridge  (as  well  it  may  be,  for  it  cost 
a  good  many  thousand  pounds)  which 
spans  the  Umgeni  River,  and  so  round  a 
sharp  turn  and  up  a  steepish  hill  to  where 
the  hotel  stands  amid  sheltering  trees 
and  a  beautiful  undergrowth  of  ferns  and 
arum  lilies.  Ho  wick  appears  to  be  all 
hotel,  for  two  have  already  been  built, 
and  a  third  is  in  progress.  A  small  store 
and  a  pretty  wee  church  are  all  the  other 
component  parts  of  the  place.  Our  ho- 
tel is  delightful,  with  an  enchanting  view 
of  the  Umgeni  widening  out  as  it  ap- 
proaches the  broad  cliff  from  which  it 
leaps  a  few  hundred  yards  farther  on. 

Now,  ever  since  I  arrived  in  Natal  I 
have  been  pining  to  see  a  real  mountain 
and  a  real  river— not  a  big  hill  or  a  ca- 
pricious spruit,  sometimes  a  ditch  and 
sometimes  a  lake,  but  a  respectable  river, 
too  deep  to  be  muddy.  Here  it  is  before 
me  at  last,  the  splendid  Umgeni,  curving 
among  the  hills,  wide  and  tranquil,  yet 
with  a  rushing  sound  suggestive  of  its  im- 
mense volume.  We  can't  waste  a  mo- 
ment in-doors  :  not  even  the  really  nice 
fresh  butter — and  what  a  treat  that  is  you 
must  taste  Maritzburg  butter  to  under- 
stand— nor  the  warm  tea  can  detain  us 
for  long.  We  snatch  up  our  shawls  and 
run  out  in  the  gloaming  to  follow  the 


river's  sound  and  find  out  the  spot  where 
it  leaps  down.  It  is  not  difficult,  once 
we  are  in  the  open  air,  to  decide  in  which 
direction  we  must  go,  and  for  once  we 
brave  ticks,  and  even  snakes,  and  go 
straight  across  country  through  the  long 
grass.  There  it  is.  Quite  suddenly  we 
have  come  upon  it,  so  beautiful  in  its 
simplicity  and  grandeur,  no  .ripple  or 
break  to  confuse  the  eye  and  take  away 
the  sense  of  unity  and  consolidation.  The 
river  widens,  and  yet  hurries,  gathering  up 
strength  and  volume  until  it  reaches  that 
great  cliff  of  iron-stone.  You  could  drop 
a  plumb-line  over  it,  so  absolutely  straight 
is  it  for  three  hundred  and  fifty  feet.  I 
have  seen  other  waterfalls  in  other  parts 
of  the  world,  but  I  never  saw  anything 
much  more  imposing  than  this  great  per- 
pendicular sheet  of  water  broken  into  a 
cloud  of  spray  and  foam  so  soon  as  it 
touches  the  deep,  silent  basin  below. 
The  water  is  discolored  where  it  flings 
itself  over  the  cliff,  and  there  are  tinges 
and  stains  of  murky  yellow  on  it  there, 
but  the  spray  which  rises  up  from  below 
is  purer  and  whiter  than  driven  snow, 
and  keeps  a  great  bank  of  lycopodium 
moss  at  the  foot  of  the  cliff,  over  which 
it  is  driven  by  every  breath  of  air,  fresh 
and  young  and  vividly  green.  Many 
rare  ferns  and  fantastic  bushes  droop  on 
either  side  of  the  great  fall — droop  as 
if  they  too  were  giddy  with  the  noise  of 
the  water  rushing  past  them,  and  were 
going  to  fling  themselves  into  the  dark 
pools  below.  But  kindly  Nature  holds 
them  back,  for  she  needs  the  contrast  of 
branch  and  stem  to  give  effect  to  the 
purity  of  the  falling  water.  Just  one  last 
gleam  of  reflected  sunlight  gilded  the 
water's  edge  where  it  dashed  over  the 
cliff,  and  a  pale  crescent  moon  hung  low 
over  it  in  a  soft  "daffodil  sky."  It  was 
all  ineffably  beautiful  and  poetic,  and  the 
roar  of  the  falling  river  seemed  only  to 
'bring  out  with  greater  intensity  the  ab- 
solute silence  of  the  desolate  spot  and 
the  starlight  hour. 

MARCH  15. 

If  the  fall  was  beautiful  in  the  myste- 
rious gloaming,  it  looks  a  thousand  times 
more  fair  in  its  morning  splendor  of  sun- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


shine.  The  air  here  is  pleasant — almost 
cold,  and  yet  deliciously  balmy.  It  is 
certainly  an  enchanting  change  from 
Pieter  -  Maritzburg,  were  it  not  for  the 
road  which  lies  between.  It  is  not,  how- 
ever, a  road  at  all.  What  is  the  antithe- 
sis of  a  road,  I  wonder — the  opposite  of 
a  road  ?  That  is  what  the  intervening 
space  should  be  called.  After  the  river 
takes  its  leap  it  moves  quietly  away  among 
hills  and  valleys,  a  wide  sheet  of  placid 
water,  as  though  there  was  nothing  more 
needed  in  the  way  of  exertion.  I  hear 
there  are  some  other  falls,  quite  as  cha- 
racteristic in  their  way,  a  few  miles  far- 
ther in  the  interior,  but  as  the  difficulty 
of  getting  to  them  is  very  great  they 
must  wait  until  we  can  spare  a  longer 
time  here.  To-day  we  drove  across  fright- 
ful places  until  we  got  on  a  hill  just  op- 
posite the  fall.  I  am  not  generally  ner- 
vous, but  I  confess  to  a  very  bad  five 
minutes  as  we  approached  the  edge  of 
the  cliff.  The  brake  of  the  dog-cart  was 
hard  down,  but  the  horses  had  their  ears 
pricked  well  forward  and  were  leaning 
back  almost  on  their  haunches  as  we 
moved  slowly  down  the  grassy  incline. 
Every  step  seemed  as  if  it  would  take 
us  right  over  the  edge,  and  the  roar  and 
rush  of  the  falling  water  opposite  appear- 
ed to  attract  and  draw  us  toward  itself 
in  a  frightful  and  mysterious  manner.  I 
was  never  more  thankful  in  my  life  than 
when  the  horses  stood  stark  still,  planted 
their  fore  feet  firmly  forward,  and  refused, 
trembling  all  over,  to  move  an  inch  near- 
er. We  were  not  really  so  very  close  to 
the  edge,  but  the  incline  was  steep  and  the 
long  grass  concealed  that  there  was  any 
ground  beyond.  After  all,  I  liked  bet- 
ter returning  to  a  cliff  a  good  deal  near- 
er to  the  falls,  where  a  rude  seat  of  stones 
had  been  arranged  on  a  projecting  point 
ti  om  whence  there  was  an  excellent  view. 
I  asked,  as  one  always  does,  whether 
there  had  ever  been  any  accidents,  and 
among  other  narratives  of  peril  and  dis- 
aster I  heard  this  one. 

Some  years  ago — nothing  would  in- 
duce the  person  who  told  me  the  story 
to  commit  himself  to  any  fixed  period 
or  any  nearer  date  than  this — a  wagon 
drawn  by  a  long  team  of  oxen  was  at- 
5 


tempting  to  cross  the  "drift,"  or  ford, 
which  used  to  exist  a  very  short  way 
above  the  falls.  I  saw  the  spot  after- 
ward, and  it  really  looked  little  short  of 
madness  to  have  attempted  to  establish 
a  ford  so  near  the  place  where  the  river 
falls  over  this  great  cliff.  They  tried  to 
build  a  bridge,  even,  at  the  same  spot, 
but  it  was  swept  away  over  and  over 
again,  and  some  of  the  buttresses  remain 
standing  to  this  day.  One  of  them  rests 
on  a  small  islet  between  the  river  and 
the  cliff,  only  a  few  yards  away  from 
the  brink  of  the  precipice.  It  is  a  sort 
of  rudimentary  island,  formed  by  great 
blocks  of  stone  and  some  wind-blown 
earth  in  which  a  few  rank  tufts  of  grass 
have  taken  root,  binding  it  all  together. 
But  this  island  does  not  divide  the  vol- 
ume of  water  as  it  tumbles  headlong 
over  the  cliff,  for  the  river  is  only  parted 
by  it  for  a  brief  moment.  It  sweeps  rap- 
idly round  on  either  side  of  the  frail  ob- 
stacle, and  then  unites  itself  again  into 
a  broad  sheet  just  before  its  leap.  The 
old  boers  used  to  imagine  that  this  island 
broke  the  force  of  the  current,  and  would 
protect  them  from  being  carried  over  the 
falls  by  it.  In  winter,  when  the  water  is 
low  and  scarce,  this  may  be  so,  but  in 
summer  it  is  madness  to  trust  to  it.  Any- 
way, the  Dutchman  got  his  team  half- 
way across,  a  Kafir  sitting  in  the  wagon 
and  driving,  another  lad  acting  as  "  fore- 
looper"  and  guiding  the  "span"  (as  a 
team  is  called  here).  The  boer  prudent- 
ly rode,  and  had  no  sooner  reached  the 
midstream  than  he  perceived  the  current 
to  be  of  unusual  depth  and  swiftness. 
He  managed,  however,  to  struggle  across 
to  the  opposite  bank,  and  from  thence  he 
beheld  his  wagon  overturn,  his  goods 
wash  out  of  it  and  sweep  like  straws 
over  the  precipice  :  as  for  the  poor  little 
forelooper,  nobody  knows  what  became 
of  him.  The  overturned  wagon,  with 
the  struggling  oxen  still  yoked  to  it  and 
the  Kafir  driver  clinging  on,  swept  to 
the  edge  of  the  falls.  There  a  lucky 
promontory  of  this  miniature  island 
caught  and  held  it  fast,  drowning  some 
of  the  poor  bullocks  indeed,  but  saving 
the  wagon.  Doubtless,  the  Kafir  might 
easily  have  saved  himself,  for  he  had 


66 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


hold  of  the  wagon  when  it  was  checked 
in  its  rapid  rush.  But  instead  of  grasp- 
ing at  bush  or  rock,  at  a  wheel  or  the 
horn  of  a  bullock,  he  stood  straight  up, 
holding  his  whip  erect  in  his  right  hand, 
and  with  one  loud  defiant  whoop  of  ex- 
ultation jumped  straight  over  the  fearful 
ledge.  His  master  said  the  fright  must 
have  driven  him  mad,  for  he  rode  furi- 
ously along  the  bank  shouting  words  of 
help  and  encouragement,  which  prob- 
ably the  poor  Kafir  never  heard,  for  he 
believed  his  last  hour  had  come  and 
sprang  to  meet  the  death  before  him 
with  that  dauntless  bravery  which  sav- 
ages so  often  show  in  the  face  of  the  in- 
evitable. As  one  sat  in  safety  and  look- 
ed at  the  rushing,  irresistible  water,  one 
could  easily  picture  to  one's  self  the  strug- 
gling pile  of  wagon  and  oxen  in  the  wa- 
ter just  caught  back  at  the  edge,  the  fran- 
tic horseman  by  the  river-side  gesticula- 
ting wildly,  and  the  ebony  figure  erect 
and  fearless,  with  the  long  streaming 
whip  held  out,  taking  that  desperate  leap 
as  though  of  his  own  free  will. 

I  think  we  spent  the  greater  part  of 
the  day  at  the  fall,  looking  at  it  under 
every  effect  of  passing  cloud-shadow  or 
sunny  sky,  beneath  the  midday  brilliancy 
of  an  almost  tropical  sun  and  in  the  soft 
pearly-gray  tints  of  the  short  twilight. 
The  young  moon  set  almost  as  soon  as 
she  rose,  and  gave  no  light  to  speak  of: 
it  was  therefore  no  use  stumbling  in  the 
dark  to  the  edge  of  so  dangerous  a  cleft 
when  we  could  see  nothing  except  the 
ghostly  shimmer  of  spray  down  below, 
and  only  hear  the  ceaseless  roar  of  the 
water.  So  how  do  you  think  we  amused 
ourselves  after  our  late  dinner  ?  We  went 
to  a  traveling  circus  advertised  to  play 
at  Howick"for  one  night  only."  That 
is  to  say,  it  was  not  there  at  all,  because 
the  wagons  had  all  stuck  fast  in  some  of 
the  holes  in  that  fearful  road.  But  the 
performing  dogs  and  ponies  had  not 
stuck,  nor  the  "  boneless  boy.  "  He  could 

not  stick  anywhere,"  as  G remarked, 

and  they  held  a  little  performance  of  their 
own  in  a  room  at  the  other  hotel.  Thith- 
er we  stumbled  through  pitchy  darkness 

at  nine  o'clock,  G insisting  on  being 

taken  out  of  bed  and  dressed  again  to 


come  with  us.  There  was  a  good  deal 
of  difference  between  the  behavior  and 
demeanor  of  the  black  and  white  spec- 
tators of  that  small  performance.  The 
Kafirs  sat  silent,  dignified  and  attentive, 
gazing  with  wide-open  eyes  at  the  "  bone- 
less boy,"  who  turned  himself  upside 
down  and  inside  out  in  the  most  per- 
plexing fashion.  "What  do  you  think 
of  it?"  I  asked  a  Kafir  who  spoke  Eng- 
lish. "  Him  master  take  all  him  bone 
out  'fore  him  begin,  inkosa-casa :  when 
him  finish,  put  'em  all  back  again  inside 
him ;"  and  indeed  that  was  what  our 
pliable  friend  looked  like.  We  two  la- 
dies— for  I  had  the  rare  treat  of  a  charm- 
ing companion  of  my  own  "sect"  on 
this  occasion — could  not  remain  long, 
however,  on  account  of  our  white  neigh- 
bors. Many  were  drunk,  all  were  up- 
roarious. They  lighted  their  cigars  with 
delightful  colonial  courtesy  and  inde- 
pendence, and  called  freely  for  more 
liquor ;  so  we  were  obliged  to  leave  the 
boneless  one  in  the  precise  attitude  of 
one  of  those  porcelain  grotesque  mon- 
sters one  sees,  his  feet  held  tightly  in  his 
hands  on  either  side  of  his  little  grin- 
ning Japanese  face,  and  his  body  dis- 
posed comfortably  in  an  arch  over  his 

head.     Even  G had  to  give  up  and 

come  away,  for  he  was  stifled  by  smoke 
and  frightened  by  the  noise.  The  sec- 
ond rank  of  colonists  here  do  not  seem 
to  me  to  be  drawn  from  so  respectable 
and  self-respecting  a  class  as  those  I 
came  across  in  New  Zealand  and  Austra- 
lia. Perhaps  it  is  demoralizing  to  them 
to  find  themselves,  as  it  were,  over  the 
black  population  whom  they  affect  to  de- 
spise and  yet  cannot  do  without.  They 
do  not  seem  to  desire  contact  with  the 
larger  world  outside,  nor  to  receive  or 
welcome  the  idea  of  progress  which  is 
the  life-blood  of  a  young  colony.  Natal 
resembles  an  overgrown  child  with  very 
bad  manners  and  a  magnificent  igno- 
rance of  its  own  shortcomings. 

At  daylight  next  morning  we  were  up 
betimes  and  made  an  early  start,  so  as 
to  avoid  the  heat  of  the  morning  sun. 
A  dense  mist  lay  close  to  the  earth  as 
far  as  the  eye  could  reach,  and  out  of 
its  soft  white  billows  only  the  highest 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


of  the  hilltops  peeped  like  islands  in 
a  lake  of  fleecy  clouds.  We  bumped 
along  in  our  usual  style,  here  a  hole, 
there  a  boulder,  slipping  now  on  a  steep 
cutting  —  for  this  damp  mist  makes  the 
hillsides  very  "greasy,"  as  our  driver 
remarked — climbing  painfully  over  ridge 
after  ridge,  until  we  came  to  the  highest 
point  of  the  road  between  us  and  Maritz- 
burg.  Here  we  paused  for  a  few  mo- 
ments to  breathe  our  panting  team  and 
to  enjoy  the  magnificent  view.  I  have 
at  last  seen  a  river  worthy  of  the  name, 
and  now  I  see  mountains  —  not  the  in- 
cessant rising  hills  which  have  opened 
out  before  me  in  each  fresh  ascent,  but 
a  splendid  chain  of  lofty  mountains — not 
peaks,  for  they  are  nearly  all  cut  quite 
straight  against  the  sky,  but  level  lines  far 
up  beyond  the  clouds,  which  are  just  flush- 
ing red  with  the  sunrise.  The  mountains 
are  among  and  behind  the  clouds,  and 
have  not  yet  caught  any  of  the  light  and 
color  of  the  new  day.  They  loom  dimly 
among  the  growing  cloud-splendors,  cold 
and  ashen  and  sombre,  as  befits  their 
majestic  outlines.  These  are  the  Drak- 
enfels,  snow-covered  except  in  the  hot- 
test weather.  I  miss  the  serrated  peaks 
of  the  Southern  Alps  and  the  grand  con- 
fusion of  the  Himalayan  range.  These 
mountains  are  lofty,  indeed  rise  far  into 
cloudland,  but  except  for  a  mighty  crag 
or  a  huge  notch  here  and  there  they  rep- 
resent a  series  of  straight  lines  against 
the  sky.  This  is  evidently  the  peculiar- 
ity of  the  mountain  -  formation  of  South 
Africa.  I  noticed  it  first  in  Table  Moun- 
tain at  Cape  Town  :  it  is  repeated  in  ev- 
ery little  hill  between  D'Urban  and  Ma- 
ritzburg,  and  now  it  is  before  me,  carried 
out  on  a  gigantic  scale  in  this  splendid 
range.  My  eye  is  not  used  to  it,  I  sup- 
pose, for  I  hear  better  judges  of  outline 
and  proportion  than  I  am  declare  it  is 


characteristic  and  soothing,  with  all  sorts 
of  complimentary  adjectives  to  which  I 
listen  in  respectful  silence,  but  with  which 
I  cannot  agree  in  my  secret  heart.  I 
like  mountains  to  have  peaks  for  sum- 
mits, and  not  horizontal  lines,  no  matter 
how  lofty  these  lines  may  be.  It  was  a 
beautiful  scene,  for  from  the  Drakenfcls 
down  to  where  we  stood  there  rolled  a 
very  ocean  of  green,  billowy  hills,  softly 
folded  over  each  other,  with  delicious  pur- 
ple shadows  in  their  hollows  and  shining 
pale -green  lights  on  their  sunny  slopes. 
We  had  left  the  Umgeni  so  far  behind 
that  it  only  showed  like  a  broad  silver  rib- 
bon here  and  there,  while  the  many  red 
roads  stretching  away  into  the  background 
certainly  derived  enchantment  from  dis- 
tance. The  foreground  was  made  lively 
by  an  encampment  of  wagons  which  were 
just  going  to  "in-span  "  and  start.  The 
women  fussed  about  the  gypsy-like  fires 
getting  breakfast,  the  Kafirs  shouted  to 
the  bullocks  prudently  grazing  until  the 
last  moment,  and  last,  not  least,  to  the 

intense  delight  of  G ,  four  perfectly 

tame  ostriches  were  walking  leisurely 
among  the  wagons  eating  food  out  of  the 
children's  hands  and  looking  about  for 
"digesters"  among  the  grass.  I  felt  in- 
clined to  point  out  the  boulders  with 
which  the  road  was  strewn  to  their  fa- 
vorable notice.  They  had  come  from  far 
in  the  interior,  from  the  distant  borders  of. 
the  Transvaal,  a  weary  way  off.  These 
ostriches  were  the  family  pets,  and  were 
going  to  be  sold  and  sent  to  England. 
The  travelers — "trekkers"  is  the  cor- 
rect word  —  expected  to  get  at  least  thir-r 
ty-five  pounds  each  for  these  splendid 
male  birds  in  full  plumage,  and  they 
were  probably  worth  much  more.  We 
made  a  fresh  start  from  this,  and  the 
best  of  our  way  into  Maritzburg  before 
the  sun  became  too  overpowering. 


MARITZBURG,  April  4. 

CAN  you  believe  that  we  are  crying 
out  for  rain  already,  and  anxiously 
scanning  the  clouds  as  they  bank  up 
over  the  high  hills  to  the  south-west  ? 
But  so  it  is.  It  would  be  a  dreadful  mis- 
fortune if  the  real  dry  weather  were  to 
set  in  so  early,  and  without  the  usual 
heavy  downfall  of  rain  which  fills  the 
tanks  and  spruits,  and  wards  off  the  evil 
day  of  a  short  water-supply  and  no  grass. 
Besides  which,  everybody  here  faithfully 
promises  pleasanter  weather  —  weather 
more  like  one's  preconceived  idea  of  the 
climate  of  Natal — after  a  regular  three 
days'  rain.  It  is  high  time — for  my  tem- 
per, as  well  as  for  the  tanks — that  this 
rain  should  come,  for  the  slow,  dragging 
summer  days  are  now  only  broken  by 
constant  gales  of  hot  wind.  These  same 
hot  winds  are  worse  than  anything — more 
exasperating  and  more  exhausting — nor 
does  a  drop  of  dew  fall  at  night  to  refresh 
the  fast-browning  vegetation  over  which 
they  scatter  a  thick  haze  of  dust.  Hot 
winds  are  bad  enough  in  India,  lived 
through  in  large,  airy,  lofty  rooms,  with 
mats  of  fragrant  grass  kept  constantly 
wet  and  hung  at  every  door  and  window — 
with  punkahs  and  ice,  and  all  the  neces- 
sary luxury  and  idle  calm  of  Indian  life. 
What  must  they  be  here — and  remember, 
the  wind  is  just  as  hot,  only  it  blows  for 
shorter  intervals,  instead  of  continuously 
for  months — in  small  houses,  with  low 
rooms  of  eight  or  ten  feet  square,  and  in 
a  country  where  the  mistress  of  the  house 
is  head-cook,  head-nurse,  head-house- 
maid, and  even  head  -  coachman  and 
gardener,  and  where  a  glass  of  cold  wa- 
ter is  a  luxury  only  dreamed  of  in  one's 
feverish  slumbers  ?  Nature  demands 
that  we  should  all  be  lotos-eaters  and  lie 
"propt  on  beds  of  amaranth  and  moly  " 
— at  all  events  from  November  to  April. 
Necessity  insists  on  our  rising  early  and 
going  to  bed  late,  and  eating  the  bread 
of  carefulness  during  all  those  hot  weeks. 
68 


That  is  to  say,  one  must  work  very  hard 
one's  self  if  one  desires  to  have  a  toler- 
ably clean  and  comfortable  house  and  to 
live  in  any  sort  of  rational  and  civilized 
fashion.  For  my  part,  I  like  hard  work, 
speaking  generally,  but  not  in  a  hot  wind. 
Yet  people  seem  to  be  pretty  well,  except 
their  tempers — again  speaking  for  myself 
— so  I  suppose  the  climate  is  disagreeable 
rather  than  actually  unhealthy. 

I  feel  it  is  exceedingly  absurd  the  way 
I  dilate  incessantly  upon  three  topics — 
roads  (I  promise  faithfully  not  to  say  a 
word  about  them  this  time),  weather  (I 
have  had  my  grumble  at  that,  and  feel 
all  the  better  for  it),  and  servants.  We 
have  lately  added  to  our  establishment 
a  Kafir-girl  who  is  a  real  comfort  and 
help.  Ma/ia  —  for  Kafirs  cannot  pro- 
nounce the  letter  r:  "red"  is  always 
"led"  with  them,  and  so  on — is  a  short, 
fat,  good-humored-looking  damsel  of  fif- 
teen years  of  age,  but  who  looks  thirty. 
Regarded  as  a  servant,  there  is  still  much 
to  be  desired,  in  spite  of  the  careful  and 
excellent  training  she  has  enjoyed  in  the 
household  of  the  bishop  of  Natal,  but  as 

a  playmate  for  G ,  who  is  teaching 

her  the  noble  game  of  cricket,  or  as  a 
nursemaid  for  the  baby,  she  is  indeed  a 
treasure  of  sweet-temper  and  willingness. 
To  be  sure,  she  did  race  the  perambula- 
tor down  a  steep  hill  the  other  day,  up- 
setting the  baby  and  breaking  the  small 
vehicle  into  bits,  but  still  English  nurse- 
maids do  the  same,  and  do  not  tell  the 
truth  about  it  at  once,  as  Malia  did.  It 
was  done  to  amuse  the  two  children,  and 
answered  that  part  of  the  programme 
excellently  well,  even  the  final  upset 
eliciting  peals  of  laughter  from  both  the 
mischievous  monkeys.  It  is  also  rather 
singular  that  in  spite  of  the  extreme 
slowness  and  deliberation  of  her  move- 
ments she  breaks  quite  as  much  crock- 
ery in  a  week  as  any  one  else  would  in 
a  year.  And  she  is  so  inexpressibly 
quaint  about  it  all  that  one  has  neither 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


69 


the  heart  nor  the  command  of  counte- 
nance requisite  to  scold.  I  handed  her 
a  saucer  last  night  to  put  down.  The 
next  moment  she  remarked  in  her  sin- 
gularly sweet  and  gentle  voice  and  pret- 
ty, musical  accent,  "  Now,  here  is  the 
saucer  in  three  pieces."  So  it  was  ;  and 
how  she  broke  it  without  dropping  it 
must  ever  be  a  mystery  to  me.  It  was 
like  a  conjuring  trick,  but  it  occurs  some- 
what too  often.  Malia  ought  not  to  be  a 
housemaid  at  all,  for  she  has  a  thirst  for 
knowledge  which  is  very  remarkable, 
and  a  good  deal  of  musical  talent.  She 
speaks  and  reads  three  languages — Ka- 
fir, -English  and  Dutch  —  with  perfect 
ease  and  fluency ;  and  is  trying  hard  to 
learn  to  write,  practicing  incessantly  on 
a  slate ;  she  is  always  whistling  or  sing- 
ing, or  picking  out  tunes  on  a  sort  of 
pipe,  on  which  she  plays  some  airs  very 
prettily.  Every  spare  moment  of  her 
time  she  is  poring  over  a  book,  and  her 
little  Kafir  Bible  is  ever  at  hand.  I  wish 
with  all  my  heart  that  I  had  time  to  teach 
her  to  write  and  to  learn  Kafir  from  her 
myself,  but  except  on  Sunday,  when  I 
read  with  her  and  hear  her  say  some 
hymns,  I  never  have  a  moment.  She  is 
so  anxious  to  learn,  poor  girl !  that  she 
watches  her  opportunity,  and  when  I  sit 
down  to  brush  my  hair  or  lace  my  boots 
she  drops  on  one  knee  by  my  side,  pro- 
duces her  book  from  her  pocket,  and 
says  in  the  most  calinante  voice,  "Sail  I 
lead  to  you  a  little,  inkosa  casa  ?"  Who 
could  have  the  heart  to  say  no,  although 
my  gravity  is  sorely  tried  by  some  pecu- 
liarities of  pronunciation  ?  She  cannot 
say  "  such  :"  it  is  too  harsh,  and  the  near- 
est we  can  arrive  at,  after  many  efforts, 
is  "sush."  Almost  every  word  has  a 
vowel  tacked  on  to  the  end,  so  as  to 
bring  it  as  near  to  her  own  liquid,  soft- 
sounding  Zulu  as  possible.  I  think  what 
upsets  me  most  is  to  hear  our  first  parents 
perseveringly  called  '"Dam  and  Eva," 
but  indeed  most  of  the  Bible  names  are 
difficult  of  recognition.  Yet  her  idioms 
are  perfect,  and  she  speaks  in  well- 
chosen,  rather  elegant  phraseology.  Ev- 
ery alternate  Sunday,  Malia  goes  down 
to  town  dressed  in  the  smartest  of  bright 
pink  cotton  frocks,  made  very  full  and 


very  short,  a  clean  white  apron,  and  a 
sky-blue  kerchief  arranged  on  her  head 
in  a  becoming  turban.  Malia's  shy  grins 
of  delight  and  pride  as  she  comes  thus 
arrayed  to  make  me  her  parting  curtsey 
are  quite  charming  to  behold,  and  dis- 
play a  set  of  teeth  which  it  would  be 
hard  to  match  for  beauty  anywhere  out 
of  Kafirland.  Indeed,  all  these  people 
seem  to  possess  most  exquisite  teeth,  and 
they  take  great  care  of  them,  rinsing 
their  mouths  and  polishing  thes'e  even, 
glistening  pearls  at  every  opportunity. 

The  more  I  see  of  the  Kafirs,  the  more 
I  like  them.  People  tell  me  they  are 
unreliable,  but  I  find  them  gay  and 
good-humored,  docile  and  civil.  Every 
cowherd  on  the  veldt  has  his  pretty 
"sako"  bow  (phonetic  spelling  again, 
on  my  part)  as  he  passes  me  when  I  am 
fern  "or  grass -seed  hunting  in  the  early 
morning,  and  I  hear  incessant  peals  of 
laughter  from  kitchen  and  stable.  Of 
course,  laughter  probably  means  idle- 
ness, but  I  have  not  the  heart  to  go  out 
every  time  (as  indeed  I  ought,  I  believe) 
and  make  them,  as  Mr.  Toots  calls  it, 
"  resume  their  studies."  Their  mirth  is 
very  different  from  that  of  my  old  friends 
the  West  Indian  negroes,  who  are  always 
chattering  and  grinning.  The  true  Ka- 
firs wear  a  stolid  expression  of  counte- 
nance in  public,  and  are  not  easily  moved 
to  signs  of  surprise  or  amusement,  but  at 
home  they  seem  to  me  a  very  merry  and 
sociable  people.  Work  is  always  a  dif- 
ficulty and  a  disagreeable  to  them,  and 
I  fear  that  many  generations  must  pass 
before  a  Kafir  will  do  a  hand's  turn  more 
than  is  actually  necessary  to  keep  his 
body  and  soul  together.  They  are  very 
easily  trained  as  domestic  servants,  in 
spite  of  the  drawback  of  not  understand- 
ing half  what  is  said  to  them,  and  they 
make  especially  good  grooms.  The  most 
discouraging  part  of  the  training  process, 
however,  is  that  it  is  wellnigh  perpetual, 
for  except  gypsies  I  don't  believe  there 
is  on  the  face  of  the  earth  a  more  rest- 
less, unsettled  human  being  than  your 
true  Kafir.  Change  he  seems  to  crave 
for,  and  change  he  will  have,  acknow- 
ledging half  his  time  that  he  knows  it 
must  be  for  the  worse.  He  will  leave  a 


7° 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


comfortable,  easy  place,  where  he  is  well 
treated  and  perfectly  happy,  for  harder 
work,  and  often  blows,  just  for  the  sake 
of  a  change.  No  kindness  can  attach 
him,  except  in  the  rarest  instances,  and 
nothing  upon  earth  could  induce  him  to 
forego  his  periodical  visits  to  his  own 
kraal.  This  means  a  return,  for  the  time 
being,  to  barbarism,  which  seems  very 
strange  when  a  man  has  had  time  to  get 
accustomed  to  clothes  and  a  good  room 
and  good  food,  and  the  hundred  and  one 
tastes  which  civilization  teaches.  Imag- 
ine laying  aside  the  comforts  and  decen- 
cies of  life  to  creep  in  at  the  low  door  of 
a  big  beehive,  and  squat  naked  round 
a  huge  fire,  smoking  filthy  tobacco  and 
drinking  a  kind  of  beer  which  is  made 
from  mealies  !  I've  often  seen  this  beer, 
and  Charlie  is  very  anxious  I  should 
taste  it,  bringing  me  some  occasionally 
in  an  old  biscuit-tin  with  assurances  that 
"Ma"'  will  find  it  very  good.  But  I 
cannot  get  beyond  looking  at  it,  for  it  is 
difficult  to  associate  the  idea  of  beer  with 
a  thick  liquid  resembling  dirty  chocolate 
more  than  anything  else.  So  I  always 
stave  off  the  evil  day  of  tasting  with  ingeni- 
ous excuses. 

Perhaps  the  Kafirs  are  more  behind- 
hand in  medical  faith  than  in  any  other 
respect.  The  other  day  one  of  our  Ka- 
firs had  a  bad  bilious  attack,  and,  de- 
clining all  offers  of  more  civilized  treat- 
ment, got  one  of  his  own  physicians  to 
bleed  him  in  the  great  toe,  with,  as  he 
declared,  the  happiest  effect.  Certain  it 
is  that  in  the  afternoon  he  reported  him- 
self as  perfectly  well.  But  the  most  ex- 
traordinary kind  of  remedy  came  be- 
fore me  quite  lately.  Tom  had  a  fright- 
ful headache,  which  is  not  to  be  wonder- 
ed at,  considering  how  that  boy  smokes 
the  strongest  tobacco  out  of  a  cow's  horn 
morning,  noon  and  night,  to  say  noth- 
ing of  incessant  snuff-taking.  The  first 
I  heard  of  Tom's  headache  was  when 
Charlie  came  to  ask  me  for  a  remedy ; 
which  I  thought  very  nice  on  his  part, 
because  he  and  Tom  live  in  a  chronic 
state  of  quarreling,  and  half  my  time  is 
taken  up  in  keeping  the  peace  between 
them.  However,  I  told  Charlie  that  I 
knew  of  no  remedy  for  a  bad  headache 


except  going  to  bed,  and  that  was  what 
I  should  advise  Tom  to  do.  Charlie 
smiled  rather  contemptuously,  as  if  pity- 
ing my  ignorance,  and  asked  if  I  would 
give  him  a  box  of  wooden  matches.  Now, 
matches  are  a  standing  grievance  in  a 
Kafir  establishment,  and  go  at  the  rate 
of  a  box  a  day  if  not  carefully  locked 
up;  so  I,  failing  to  connect  wooden 
matches  and  Tom's  headache  together, 
began  a  reproachful  catalogue  of  how 
many  boxes  he  had  asked  for  lately. 
Charlie,  however,  hastily  cut  me  short 
by  saying,  "But,  ma',  it  for  make  Tom 
well."  So  of  course  I  produced  a  box  of 
Bryant  £  May,  and  stood  by  to  watch 
Charlie  doctoring  Tom.  Match  after 
match  did  Charlie  strike,  holding  the 
flaming  splinter  up  Tom's  exceedingly 
wide  nostrils,  until  the  box  was  empty. 
Tom  winced  a  good  deal,  but  bore  this 
singeing  process  with  great  fortitude.  Ev- 
ery now  and  then  he  cried  out,  as  well 
he  might,  when  Charley  thrust  a  freshly- 
lighted  match  up  his  nose,  but  on  the 
whole  he  stood  it  bravely,  and  by  the 
time  the  matches  were  all  burned  out  he 
declared  his  headache  was  quite  cured, 
and  that  he  was  ready  to  go  and  chop 
wood;  nor  would  he  listen  to  the  idea 
of  going  to  bed.  "  It  very  good  stuff  to 
smell,  ma',"  said  Charlie:  "it  burn  de 
sickness  away."  Kafirs  are  inexpress- 
ibly queer,  too,  about  their  domestic  ar- 
rangements ;  and  I  had  a  long  argument 
with  a  Kafir-woman  only  the  other  day, 
through  Malia's  interpretation,  as  to  the 
propriety  of  killing  one  of  her  babies 
when  she  chanced  to  have  twins.  My 
dusky  friend  declared  it  was  much  the 
best  plan,  and  one  which  was  always  fol- 
lowed when  the  whites  did  not  interfere. 
If  both  children  were  kept  alive,  she 
averred  they  would  both  be  wretched, 
puny  little  creatures,  and  would  be  quite 
sure  to  die  eventually;  so,  as  a  Kafir 
looks  to  his  children  to  take  care  of  and 
work  for  him,  even  in  his  middle  age, 
the  sons  by  their  wages,  the  daughters 
by  their  dowries,  or  rather  by  the  prices 
paid  for  them,  she  declared  it  was  very 
bad  economy  to  try  and  rear  two  babies 
at  once,  and  calmly  recapitulated  the  in- 
stances in  her  own  and  her  neighbors' 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


families  where  one  wretched  twin  had 
been  killed  to  give  the  other  a  better 
chance.  She  confessed  she  had  been 
much  puzzled  upon  one  occasion  when 
the  twins  were  a  girl  and  a  boy,  for  both 
would  have  been  useful  hereafter.  "  I 
thought  of  the  cows  I  should  get  for  the 
girl,"  she  said,  "and  then  I  thought  of 
the  boy's  wages,  and  I  didn't  know  which 
to  keep ;  but  the  girl,  she  cry  most,  so  I 
kill  her,  and  the  boy  grow  up  very  good 
boy  —  earn  plenty  money."  That  was 
Malia's  interpretation,  for,  although  she 
speaks  excellent  English,  when  another 
person's  words  have  to  be  reproduced 
her  tenses  get  a  little  confused  and  jum- 
bled up.  But  she  is  a  capital  mouth- 
piece, and  it  always  amuses  me  to  bar- 
gain, through  her,  for  my  eggs  and  chick- 
ens and  mealies.  Sorry  bargaining  it  is, 
generally  resulting  in  my  paying  double 
the  market-price  for  these  commodities. 
Lately  I  have  been  even  more  fleeced 
than  usual,  especially  by  my  egg-man, 
who  is  an  astute  old  Kafir,  very  much 
adorned  with  circlets  of  copper  wire  on 
his  legs  and  arms.  He  brings  his  eggs 
in  a  bag,  which  he  swings  about  so  reck- 
lessly that  it  is  a  perpetual  marvel  to  me 
how  they  escape  annihilation.  Every 
time  he  comes  he  adds  threepence  to  the 
price  of  his  eggs  per  dozen  on  account 
of  the  doubled  hut-tax ;  and  I  assure 
him  that  in  time  it  will  end  in  my  having 
paid  the  whole  amount  instead  of  him. 
Hitherto,  the  natives  have  paid  a  tax  of 
seven  shillings  per  annum  on  each  hut, 
but  this  year  it  has  been  doubled  ;  so  the 
Kafirs  very  sensibly  make  their  white 
customers  pay  a  heavy  percentage  on 
the  necessaries  of  life  with  which  they 
supply  them.  It  is  exactly  what  it  used 
to  be  in  London  three  or  four  years  ago, 
when  coals  were  so  costly :  everything 
rose  in  price,  from  china  vases  down  to 
hairpins  ;  so  now  this  doubled  hut-tax  is 
the  excuse  for  a  sudden  rise  in  the  value 
of  eggs,  fowls,  cows,  mealies  and  what 
not.  I  don't  understand  political  econ- 
omy myself,  but  it  always  seems  to  me 
a  curious  fact  that  although  every  article 
of  food  or  clothing  is  only  too  ready  to 
jump  up  in  price' on  the  smallest  excuse, 
it  never  copies  down  again.  I  try  to  chaff 


my  old  Kafir  egg-merchant,  and  show 
him  by  figures  that  his  extra  charge  for 
eggs  pays  his  extra  seven  shillings  in 
about  six  weeks.  I  endeavor  to  per- 
suade him,  after  this  increased  tax  is  thus 
provided  for,  to  go  back  to  his  original 
price,  but  he  smiles  knowingly  and  shakes 
his  head,  murmuring,  "  Ka,  ka,"  which 
appears  to  mean  "No." 

All  this  time,  however,  I  am  longing 
to  tell  you  of  a  famous  tea-party  I  have 
had  here  lately — a  regular  "drum,"  only 
it  beat  all  the  London  teas  hollow,  even 
with  dear  little  "Minas"*  thrown  into 
the  bargain,  because  in  the  corner  of 
my  cards  were  the  words  "Tea  and 
witches."  Now,  I  ask  you,  could  any 
one  wish  for  a  greater  excitement  than 
that  to  enliven  a  summer  afternoon  ?  At- 
tractive as  was  the  bait,  it  was  a  blunder 
or  a  fib — which  you  choose — for,  so  far 
from  being  witches,  my  five  extraordi- 
nary performers  were  the  sworn  enemies 
of  witches,  being,  in  fact,  "witch-find- 
ers," or  "witch-doctors,"  as  they  are  just 
as  often  called.  I  am  quite  sure  that  no 
one  has  ever  suffered  so  much  anxiety 
about  a  small  entertainment  as  I  did 
about  that  tea-party.  Of  course,  there 
was  the  usual  thunderstorm  due  that 
afternoon,  and  not  until  the  last  moment, 
when  the  clouds  rolled  off  toward  the 
Umgeni  valley,  leaving  us  a  glorious  sky 
and  a  pleasant  breeze,  did  I  cease  to  fear 
that  the  whole  thing  might  prove  a  fiasco. 
By  the  time  I  had  begun  to  have  con- 
fidence in  the  weather  came  a  distracted 
message  from  the  obliging  neighbor  who 
supplies  me  with  milk,  to  say  that,  as  ill- 
luck  would  have  it,  her  cows  had  select- 
ed this  particular  afternoon  of  all  the 
year  to  stray  away  and  get  themselves 
impounded,  and  that  consequently  the 
delivery  of  sundry  bottles  (everything  is 
sold  in  bottles  here)  of  new  milk  was  as 
uncertain  as — what  shall  I  say  ? — Natal 
weather,  for  nothing  can  be  more  un- 
certain than  that.  Imagine  my  dismay  ! 
No  one  even  dared  to  suggest  preserved 
milk  to  me,  so  well  known  is  my  antip- 
athy to  that  miserable  makeshift.  I 
should  have  sat  me  down  and  wept  if  at 

*  A  wonderful  performing  dog  exhibited  by  Ma- 
dame Hager,  and  much  in  request  last  season. 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


that  moment  I  had  not  discovered  a  small 
herd  of  cattle  wending  their  way  across 
the  veldt  to  my  neighbor's  gate.  Oh 
joy !  the  milk  and  the  weather  were  all 
right !  But  what  was  that  enormous  mob 
of  shouting,  singing  Kafirs  clamoring 
outside  my  garden  fence  ?  They  were 
my  witch-finders,  escorted  by  nearly  the 
whole  black  population  of  Maritzburg : 
they  had  arrived  about  three  hours  be- 
fore the  proper  time,  and  were  asking  for 
some  place  to  dress  in,  not  from  any  fastid- 
iousness, but  simply  because  they  didn't 
want  profane  eyes  to  witness  the  details 
of  assuming  their  professional  decora- 
tions. Remember,  there  was  not  a  white 
man  nearer  than  Maritzburg,  and  there 
was  nothing  upon  earth  to  prevent  any 
number  of  these  excited,  shouting  men 
and  boys  from  walking  into  my  little 
house,  or  at  least  helping  themselves  to 
anything  off  the  tea-tables,  which  the 
servants  were  beginning  to  arrange  in 
the  verandah.  But  they  were  as  docile 
and  obedient  as  possible,  readily  acced- 
ing to  my  desire  that  they  should  remain 
outside  the  fence,  and  asking  for  nothing 
except  copious  draughts  of  water.  Cer- 
tainly, I  was  armed  with  a  talisman,  for 
I  went  out  to  them  myself,  with  one  of 
my  numerous  "Jacks  "  as  an  interpreter, 
and  told  them  they  must  all  sit  down 

and  wait  patiently  until  Mr.  S (their 

own  beloved  inkosi)  came,  adding  that 
he  would  be  there  immediately.  That 
was  a  fih,  for  he  could  not  come  until 
late,  but  an  excellent  substitute  very  soon 
appeared  and  set  my  mind  partly  at  rest. 
I  say,  only  "partly,"  because  I  had  been 

so  teased  about  my  party.     F had 

been  especially  aggravating,  observing 
from  time  to  time  that  my  proceedings 
were  at  once  illegal  and  improper,  add- 
ing that  "  he  was  surprised  at  me."  Can 
you  imagine  anything  more  trying  ?  And 
yet  I  knew  quite  well  all  the  time  that  he 
was  just  as  anxious  to  see  these  people 
as  we  were,  only  he  persisted  in  being 
semi-official  and  disagreeable.  Never 
mind :  I  triumphed  over  him  afterward, 
when  it  all  went  off  so  well.  When  I 
had  leisure  to  think  of  anything  but 
whether  there  would  be  a  riot  or  not,  I 
had  horrible  misgivings  about  the  com- 


pulsory scantiness  of  my  invitations.  I 
should  have  liked  to  ask  all  my  acquaint- 
ances, as  well  as  the  few  friends  I  had 
invited,  but  what  is  one  to  do  with  a 
doll's  house  and  a  dozen  tea  -  cups  ? 
Those  were  my  resources,  and  I  taxed 
them  to  the  uttermost  as  it  was.  One 
cannot  hire  things  here,  and  I  had  no 
place  to  put  them  if  I  could ;  but  it  is 
horrid  to  feel,  as  I  did,  that  heaps  of 
people  must  have  wondered  why  they 
were  left  out. 

At  last  five  o'clock  came,  bringing  with 
it  a  regiment  of  riders,  thirsting  for  tea 
and  clamorous  to  see  the  witches,  want- 
ing their  fortunes  told,  their  lost  trinkets 
found,  and  Heaven  knows  what  besides. 
"They  are  not  witches  at  all,"  I  said 
gravely :  "  they  are  witch-finders,  and  I 
believe  the  whole  thing  is  very  wrong." 
There  was  a  depressing  announcement 
for  one's  hostess  to  make  !  But  it  had  a 
good  effect  for  the  moment,  and  sent  my 
guests  quietly  off  to  console  themselves 
with  their  tea :  that,  at  least,  could  not 
be  wrong,  especially  as  the  milk  had'ar- 
rived,  new  and  delicious.  In  the  mean 

time,  kind  Mr.  F had  gone  off  to 

fetch  the  witches,  as  everybody  persist- 
ed in  calling  them,  and  presently  they 
appeared  in  full  official  dress,  walking 
along  in  a  measured,  stately  step,  keep- 
ing time  and  tune  to  the  chanting  of  a 
body-guard  of  girls  and  women  who  sang 
continuously,  in  a  sort  of  undertone,  a 
montonous  kind  of  march.  They  made 
an  excellent  stage-entrance — grave,  com- 
posed, erect  of  carriage  and  dauntless  of 
mien.  These  Amazonian  women  walk- 
ed past  the  verandah,  raising  their  hand, 
as  the  men  do,  with  the  low  cry  of  "  In- 
kosi !"  in  salutation.  Their  pride  is  to 
be  looked  upon  as  men  when  once  they 
take  up  this  dread  profession,  which  is 
also  shared  with  them  by  men.  They 
are  permitted  to  bear  shield  and  spear 
as  warriors,  and  they  hunt  and  kill  with 
their  own  hands  the  wild  beasts  and  rep- 
tiles whose  skins  they  wear.  Their  day 
is  over  and  ended,  however,  for  the  cru- 
elties practiced  under  their,  auspices  had 
risen  to  a  great  height,  and  it  is  now 
against  the  law  to  seek  out  a  witch  by 
means  of  these  pitiless  women.  It  is  not 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


73 


difficult  to  understand — bearing  in  mind 
the  superstition  and  cruelty  which  exist- 
ed in  remote  parts  of  England  not  so 
very  long  ago — how  powerful  such  wo- 
men became  among  a  savage  people,  or 
how  tempting  an  opportunity  they  could 
furnish  of  getting  rid  of  an  enemy.  Of 
course,  they  are  exceptional  individuals, 
more  observant,  more  shrewd  and  more 
dauntless  than  the  average  fat,  hard- 
working Kafir-women,  besides  possess- 
ing the  contradictory  mixture  of  great 
physical  powers  and  strong  hysterical 
tendencies.  They  work  themselves  up 
to  a  pitch  of  frenzy,  and  get  to  believe 
as  firmly  in  their  own  supernatural  dis- 
cernment as  any  individual  among  the 
trembling  circle  of  Zulus  to  whom  a 
touch  from  the  whisk  they  carry  in  their 
hands  is  a  sentence  of  instant  death.  It 
gave  a  certain  grim  interest  to  what  a 
Scotch  friend  called  the  "  ploy  "  to  know 
that  it  had  once  been  true,  and  I  begged 

Mr.  F to  explain  to  them  before  they 

began  that  the  only  reason  I  had  wanted 
to  see  them  arose  from  pure  curiosity  to 
know  what  they  looked  like,  how  they  were 
dressed,  and  so  forth,  and  that  I  quite 
understood  that  it  was  all  nonsense  and 
very  wrong  and  against  the  law  to  do, 
really,  but  that  this  was  only  a  play  and 
pretence.  Shall  I  confess  that  I  felt  rath- 
er ashamed  at  making  this  public  avowal  ? 
But  my  conscience  demanded  it  clamor- 
ously, and  I  felt  many  misgivings  lest 
I  should  indeed  be  causing  any  "weak 
brother  to  offend."  However,  it  was  too 
late  now  for  scruples,  and  a  sort  of  shout 
came  up  from  the  good-humored,  well- 
behaved  crowd  outside,  assuring  me  they 
knew  it  was  only  for  fun  and  that  it  was 
quite  right,  and  they  were  glad  for  the 
English  "  inkosa-casa "  and  her  friends 
to  see  an  old  custom  which  it  was  a  good 
thing  to  have  done  with.  This  little 
speech,  so  full  of  true  tact,  put  me  at 
my  ease  at  once,  and  we  all  took  up  our 
position  at  one  side  of  the  little  semi- 
circular lawn,  where  the  dance-crescent 
was  already  formed,  supplying  ourselves 
the  place  of  the  supposed  ring  of  spec- 
tators and  victims.  1  wish  I  could  make 
you  see  the  scene  as  I  saw  it,  and  shall 
ever  see  it  when  I  look  back  upon  it. 


The  first  original  "tail"  of  my  witch- 
finders  had  been  supplemented  by  a 
crowd  of  people  who  formed  a  back- 
ground, keeping  perfectly  quiet,  and, 
though  uninvited  and  unexpected,  giv- 
ing not  the  slightest  trouble.  That  is  the 
odd  part  of  a  colony:  individuals  are 
rougher,  less  polite  and  more  brusque 
and  overbearing  than  the  people  one 
is  accustomed  to  see  in  England,  but  the 
moment  it  comes  to  a  great  concourse  of 
people,  then  the  absolute  respectability 
of  class  asserts  itself,  and  the  crowd — 
the  "rough"  element  being  conspicuous 
by  its  absence — is  far  more  orderly  than 
any  assemblage  of  a  dozen  people  else- 
where. Imagine  a  villa  at  Wimbledon  or 
Putney,  and  some  four  or  five  hundred 
uninvited  people  calmly  walking  into  the 
grounds  to  look  at  something  they  wish- 
ed to  see,  without  a  ghost  of  a  policeman 
or  authority  in  charge  !  Yet  that  was  our 
predicament  for  an  hour  or  two,  and  not 
a  leaf  or  rosebud  or  blade  of  grass  was 
touched  or  injured  in  any  way,  nor  was 
there  a  sound  to  be  heard  to  mar  the 
tranquil  beauty  of  that  summer  evening. 
It  was  indeed  "a  beauteous  evening, 
calm  and  free  " — in  spite  of  my  chronic 
state  of  grumbling  at  the  climate  and 
weather,  I  must  acknowledge  that — an 
evening  which  might  have  been  made 
to  order.  Recent  rains  had  washed  the 
surrounding  hills,  brightened  the  dust- 
laden  grass  to  green  once  more,  and  fresh- 
ened up  everything.  The  amphitheatre 
of  rising  ground  which  surrounds  Mar- 
itzburg  had  never  looked  more  beautiful, 
with  purple  and  blue  shadows  passing 
over  it  from  the  slow-sailing  clouds  above. 
Toward  the  west  the  sky  was  gently 
taking  that  peculiar  amethystic  glow 
which  precedes  a  fine  sunset,  and  the 
sun  itself  laid  long,  parting  lances  of 
pure  golden  light  across  hill  and  dale 
around.  A  fresh  air  came  up  from  the 
south,  blowing  softly  across  the  downs, 
and  sleepy,  picturesque  little  Maritzburg 
— empty  for  the  afternoon  of  its  inhabit- 
ants, I  should  fancy — nestled  cozily  up 
against  the  undulating  ground  opposite. 
Then,  to  come  nearer  home,  just  outside 
our  sod-fence  a  line  of  dusky  faces  rose 
above  the  ferns  and  waving  grasses — 


74 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


faces  whose  gleaming  eyes  were  riveted 
on  the  performers  within.  The  little 
drive  and  garden-paths  were  crowded 
with  strangers,  white  and  colored — all, 
as  I  said  before,  perfectly  quiet  and 
orderly,  but  evidently  interested  and 
amused.  A  semicircle  of  girls  and  wo- 
men— some  in  gay  civilized  garb,  some 
in  coarsest  drapery,  some  with  drowsy 
babies  hung  at  their  backs,  some  with 
bright  beads  on  wrist  and  neck,  but  all 
earnest  and  intent  on  their  part — stood 
like  the  chorus  of  a  Greek  play,  beating 
their  hands  together  and  singing  a  low 
monotonous  chant,  the  measure  and 
rhythm  of  which  changed  every  now 
and  again  with  a  stamp  and  a  swing.  A 
pace  or  two  in  front  of  these  singers  were 
the  witch-finders  in  full  ceremonial  dress. 
Collectively,  they  are  known  by  the  name 
of  the  "Izinyanga"  or  "Abangoma," 
but  each  had  of  course  her  distinctive 
name,  and  each  belonged  to  a  separate 
tribe.  Conspicuous  from  her  great  height, 
Nozinyanga  first  caught  my  eye,  her 
floating,  helmet-like  plume  of  the  tail- 
feathers  of  the  saka-bula  bird  shading 
her  fierce  face,  made  still  more  gruesome 
by  wafers  of  red  paint  on  cheek  and 
brow.  In  her  right  hand  she  held  a 
light  sheaf  of  assegais  or  lances,  and  on 
her  left  arm  was  slung  a  small  pretty 
shield  of  dappled  ox  hide.  Her  petti- 
coat was  less  characteristic  than  that  of 
her  sister-performers,  being  made  of  a 
couple  of  large  gay  handkerchiefs  worn 
kiltwise.  But  she  made  up  for  the  short- 
comings of  characteristic  decoration  in 
her  skirts  by  the  splendor  of  the  bead 
necklaces  and  armlets,  fringes  of  goat's 
hair  and  scarlet  tassels,  with  which  she 
was  covered  from  throat  to  waist.  A 
baldric  of  leopard  skin  was  fastened 
across  her  capacious  chest,  and  down  her 
back  hung  a  beautifully  dried  and  flat- 
tened skin  of  an  enormous  boa  constrict- 
or. This  creature  must  have  been  of  a 
prodigious  length,  for,  whilst  its  hooded 
head  was  fastened  at  the  broad  nape  of 
Nozinyanga's  neck,  its  tail  dragged  some 
two  feet  or  so  on  the  ground  behind  her. 
Now,  Nozinyanga  stood  something  like 
six  feet  two  inches  on  her  bare  feet,  but 
although  I  first  looked  at  her,  attracted 


j  by  her  tall  stature  and  defiant  pose,  the 
proceedings  were  really  opened  by  a 
small,  lithe  woman  with  a  wonderfully 
pathetic,  wistful  face,  who  seemed  more 
in  earnest  than  her  big  sisters,  and  who 
in  her  day  must  doubtless  have  brushed 
away  many  a  man's  life  with  the  quag- 
ga's  tail  she  brandished  so  lightly. 

To  make  you  understand  the  terrible  in- 
terest attaching  to  these  women,  I  ought 
to  explain  to  you  here  that  it  used  to  be  the 
custom  whenever  anything  went  wrong, 
either  politically  or  socially,  among  the 
Zulus  and  other  tribes,  to  attribute  the 
shortcomings  to  witch-agency.  The  next 
step  to  be  taken,  after  coming  to  this  res- 
olution, was  to  seek  out  and  destroy  the 
witch  or  witches  ;  and  for  this  purpose  a 
great  meeting  would  be  summoned  by 
order  of  the  king  and  under  his  super- 
intendence, and  a  large  ring  of  natives 
would  sit  trembling  and  in  fear  of  their 
lives  on  the  ground.  In  the  centre  of 
these  danced  the  witch-finders  or  witch- 
doctors ;  and  as  they  gradually  lashed 
themselves  up  to  a  frantic  state  of  frenzy 
— bordering,  in  fact,  on  demoniacal  pos- 
session— they  lightly  switched  with  their 
quagga  tail  one  or  other  of  the  quivering 
spectators.  No  sooner  had  the  fatal  brush 
passed  over  the  victim  than  he  was  drag- 
ged away  and  butchered  on  the  spot ;  and 
not  only  he,  but  all  the  live  things  in  his 
hut — wives  and  children,  dogs  and  cats 
— not  a  stick  left  standing  or  a  living 
creature  breathing.  Sometimes  a  whole 
kraal  was  exterminated  in  this  fashion  ; 
and  it  need  not  be  told  what  a  method 
it  became  of  gratifying  private  revenge 
and  paying  off  old  scores.  Of  all  the 
blessings,  so  unwillingly  and  grudgingly 
admitted,  which  ever  so  partial  a  civiliza- 
tion has  brought  to  these  difficult,  lazy, 
and  yet  pugnacious  Kafir  people,  none 
can  be  greater,  surely,  than  the  rule 
which  strictly  forbids  this  sort  of  Lynch 
law  from  being  carried  out  anywhere, 
under  any  circumstances,  by  these  priest- 
esses of  a  cruel  faith.  Now,  perhaps,  you 
see  why  there  was  such  a  strong  under- 
current of  interest  and  excitement  be- 
neath the  light  laughter  and  frolic  of  our 
summer-afternoon  tea-party. 

Nozilwane  was  the  name  of  this  tern- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA, 


75 


ble  little  sorceress,  who  frightened  more 
than  one  of  us  more  thoroughly  than  we 
should  like  to  acknowledge,  peering  up 
in  our  faces,  as  she  hung  about  the  group 
of  guests,  with  a  weird  and  wistful  glance 
which  was  both  uncanny  and  uncomfort- 
able. She  was  really  beautifully  dressed 
for  her  part  in  lynx  skins  folded  over  and 
ever  from  waist  to  knee,  and  the  upper 
part  of  her  body  covered  by  strings  of 
wild  beasts'  teeth  and  fangs,  skeins  of 
brilliantly  -  hued  yarn,  beads,  strips  of 
snake  skin  and  fringes  of  Angora  goat 
fleece.  This  was  a  singularly  effective 
and  graceful  decoration,  worn  round  the 
body  and  above  each  elbow,  and  falling 
in  soft  white  flakes  among  the  gay  color- 
ing and  against  the  dusky  skin.  Lynx 
tails  hung  down  like  lappets  on  each  side 
of  her  face,  which  was  overshadowed,  al- 
most hidden,  by  the  profusion  of  saka- 
bula  feathers.  This  bird  has  a  very  beau- 
tiful plumage,  and  is  sufficiently  rare  for 
the  natives  to  attach  a  peculiar  value  and 
charm  to  the  tail-feathers.  They  are  like 
those  of  a  young  cock,  curved  and  slen- 
der, and  of  a  dark-chestnut  color,  with  a 
white  eye  at  the  extreme  tip  of  each  fea- 
ther. Among  this  floating,  thick  plumage 
small  bladders  were  interspersed,  and 
skewers  and  pins  fashioned  out  of  tusks. 
All  the  witch-finders  wear  their  own  hair 
(or  rather  wool)  alike ;  that  is,  highly 
greased  and  twisted  up  with  twine  until 
it  loses  the  appearance  of  hair  complete- 
ly, and  hangs  around  their  faces  like  a 
thick  fringe  dyed  deep  red. 

Nozilwane  stepped  out  with  a  creeping, 
cat-like  gesture,  bent  double,  as  if  she 
were  seeking  out  a  trail.  Every  move- 
ment of  her  undulating  body  kept  time 
to  the  beat  of  the  girls'  hands  and  the 
low,  crooning  chant.  Presently,  she  af- 
fected to  find  the  clew  she  sought,  and 
sprang  aloft  with  a  series  of  wild  pirou- 
ettes, shaking  her  spears  and  brandish- 
ing her  little  shield  in  a  frenzied  fashion. 
But  Nomaruso,  albeit  much  taller  and  in 
less  good  condition  than  the  lady  of  the 
lynx  skins,  was  determined  that  she 
should  not  remain  the  cynosure  of  our 
eyes;  and  she  too,  with  a  yell  and  a 
caper,  cut  into  the  dance  to  the  sound 
of  louder  grunts  and  faster  hand-claps. 


Nomaruso  turned  her  back  to  us  a  good 
deal  in  her  performances,  conscious  of  a 
magnificent  snake  skin,  studded  besides 
in  a  regular  pattern  with  brass-headed 
nails,  which  floated  like  a  streamer  down 
her  back.  She  wore  a  magnificcnty^0# 
of  leopard  skins  decorated  with  red  ro- 
settes, and  her  toilette  was  altogether 
more  recherche  and  artistic  than  any  of 
the  others.  Her  bangles  were  brighter, 
her  goat  fringes  whiter,  and  her  face 
more  carefully  painted.  Yet  Nozilwane 
held  her  own  gallantly  in  virtue  of  being 
a  mere  bag  of  bones,  and  also  having 
youth  and  a  firm  belief  in  herself  on  her 
side.  The  others,  though  they  all  joined 
in  hunting  out  a  phantom  foe,  and  tri- 
umphed over  his  discovery  in  turn,  were 
soon  breathless  and  exhausted,  and  glad 
to  be  led  away  by  some  of  the  attendant 
women  to  be  anointed  and  to  drink  wa- 
ter. Besides  which,  they  were  all  of  a 
certain  age,  and  less  inclined  to  frisk 
about  than  the  agile  Nozilwane.  As  for 
great  big  Nozinyanga,  she  danced  like 
Queen  Elizabeth,  "  high  and  disposedly ;" 
and  no  wonder,  for  I  should  think  she 
weighed  at  least  fifteen  stone.  Umgiteni, 
in  a  petticoat  of  white  Angora  skin  and 
a  corsage  of  bladders  and  teeth,  beads 
and  viper  skins,  was  nothing  remarkable ; 
nor  was  Umanonjazzla,  a  melancholy- 
looking  woman  with  an  enormous  wig- 
like  coiffure  of  red  woolen  ringlets  and 
white  skewers.  Her  physiognomy,  too, 
was  a  trifle  more  stolid  and  common- 
place than  that  of  her  comrades ;  and  al- 
together she  gave  me  the  impression  of 
being  a  sensible,  respectable  woman  who 
was  very  much  ashamed  of  herself  for 
playing  such  antics.  However,  she  bran- 
dished her  divining-brush  with  the  rest, 
and  cut-in  now  and  then  to  "keep  the 
flure "  with  the  untiring  Nozilwane. 

All  this  time  the  chanting  and  hand- 
beating  never  ceased,  the  babies  dozed 
placidly  behind  their  mothers'  backs,  and 
we  all  began  to  think  fondly  of  a  second 
cup  of  tea.  The  sun  had  now  quite 
dropped  behind  the  high  hills  to  the 
west,  and  was  sending  long  rays  right 
up  across  the  tranquil  sky.  We  felt  we 
had  enough  of  imaginary  witch-finding, 
and  looked  about  for  some  means  of 


76 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


ending  the  affair.  "  Let  us  test  their 
powers  of  finding  things,"  said  one  of 
the  party  :  "  I  have  lost  a  silver  pipe- 
stem,  which  I  value  much."  So  the  five 
wise  women  were  bidden  to  discover  what 
was  lost,  and  where  it  was  to  be  found. 
They  set  about  this  in  a  curious  and  in- 
teresting way,  which  reminded  one  of  the 
children's  game  of  "magic  music."  In 
the  first  place,  it  was  a  relief  to  know 
there  were  not  any  ghastly  recollections 
attached  to  this  performance  ;  and  in  the 
next,  one  could  better  understand  by  the 
pantomime  what  they  were  about.  In  front 
of  us  squatted  on  heels  and  haunches  a 
semicircle  of  about  a  dozen  men,  who 
were  supposed  to  have  invoked  the  aid 
of  the  sisterhood  to  find  some  lost  prop- 
erty. These  men,  however,  did  not  in 
the  least  know  what  was  asked  for,  and 
were  told  to  go  on  with  their  part  until  a 
signal  was  given  that  the  article  had  been 
named.  They  were  all  highly  respect- 
able head-men — "indunas,"  in  fact  — 
each  worth  a  good  herd  of  cows  at  least, 
and  much  portable  property.  In  every- 
day life  it  would  have  been  hard  to  beat 
them  for  shrewd  common  sense.  Yet  it 
was  easy  to  perceive  that  the  old  savage 
instincts  and  beliefs  were  there  strong  as 
ever,  and  that  though  they  affected  to  take 
it  all,  as  we  did,  as  an  afternoon's  frolic, 
they  were  firm  believers  in  the  mystic 
power  of  the  Abangoma,  else  they  never 
could  have  played  their  parts  so  well,  so 
eagerly  and  with  such  vivid  interest. 

"What  is  it  the  inkosi  has  lost?"  they 
cried.  "Discover,  reveal,  make  plain  to 
us." 

It  was  a  good  moment  in  which  to  try 
the  experiment,  because  all  the  singing 
and  dancing  had  worked  the  Izinyanga 
up  to  a  high  pitch  of  enthusiasm  and  ex- 
citement, and  the  inspiration  was  held 
to  be  complete;  so,  without  hesitation, 
Nomaruso  accepted  the  men's  challenge 
and  cried,  "Sing  for  me:  make  a  ca- 
dence for  me."  Then,  after  a  moment's 
hesitation,  she  went  on  in  rapid,  broken 
utterance,  "  Is  this  real  ?  is  it  a  test  ?  is 
it  but  a  show  ?  do  the  white  chiefs  want 
to  laugh  at  our  pretensions?  Has  the 
white  lady  called  us  only  to  show  other 
white  people  that  we  can  do  nothing  ?  Is 


anything  really  lost?  is  it  not  hidden? 
No,  it  is  lost.  Is  it  lost  by  a  black  person  ? 
No,  a  white  person  has  lost  it.  Is  it  lost  by 
the  great  white  chief?"  (meaning  their 
own  King  of  Hearts,  their  native  minis- 
ter). "  No,  it  is  lost  by  an  ordinary  white 
man.  Let  me  see  what  it  is  that  is  lost. 
Is  it  money  ?  No.  Is  it  a  weighty  thing  ? 
No,  it  can  be  always  carried  about :  it  is 
not  heavy.  All  people  like  to  carry  it, 
especially  the  white  inkosi.  It  is  made 
of  the  same  metal  as  money.  I  could 
tell  you  more,  but  there  is  no  earnestness 
in  all  this  :  it  is  only  a  spectacle." 

Between  each  of  these  short  sentences 
the  seeress  made  a  pause  and  eagerly 
scanned  the  faces  of  the  men  before  her. 
For  safe  reply  they  gave  a  loud,  simul- 
taneous snap  of  their  finger  and  thumb, 
pointing  toward  the  ground  as  they  did 
so  and  shouting  but  one  word,  "Y-i-z- 
wa !"  (the  first  syllable  tremendously  ac- 
cented and  drawn  out),  "discover — re- 
veal." That  is  all  they  can  say  to  urge 
her  on,  for  in  this  case  they  know  not 
themselves;  but  the  priestesses  watch 
their  countenances  eagerly  to  see  if  hap- 
pily there  may  be,  consciously  or  uncon- 
sciously, some  sign  or  token  whether,  as 
children  say  in  their  games,  they  are 
"hot"  or  not. 

Nomaruso  will  say  no  more  —she  sus- 
pects a  trick — but  Nozilwane  rushes  about 
like  one  possessed,  sobbing  and  quiver- 
ing with  excitement.  "  It  is  this—  it  is 
that."  Gigantic  Nozinyanga  strikes  her 
lance  firmly  into  the  ground  and  cries 
haughtily,  in  her  own  tongue,  "  It  is  his 
watch,"  looking  round  as  though  she 
dared  us  to  contradict  her.  The  other 
three  join  hands  and  gallopade  round 
and  round,  making  the  most  impossible 
suggestions;  but  the  "inquirers."  as  the 
kneeling  men  are  called,  give  them  no 
clew  or  help,  nothing  but  the  rapid  finger- 
snap,  the  hand  pointed  sternly  down  to 
the  ground,  as  though  they  were  to  seek 
it  there,  and  the  fast-following  cry,  "  Yiz- 
wa,  yizwa !" 

At  last  Nozilwane  has  it:  "His  pipe." 
("Yizwa,  yizwa!")  "A  thing  which  has 
come  off  his  pipe  ;"  and  so  it  is.  Nozil- 
wane's  pluck  and  perseverance  and  cun- 
ning watching  of  our  faces  at  each  hit 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


77 


she  made  have  brought  her  off  triumph- 
antly. A  grunt  and  a  murmur  of  admi- 
ration go  round.  The  indunas  jump  up 
and  subside  into  ebony  images  of  im- 
passive respectability ;  the  chorus,  sore- 
ly weary  by  this  time,  breaks  up  into 
knots,  and  the  weird  sisterhood  drop  as 
if  by  one  accord  on  their  knees,  sitting 
back  on  their  heels,  before  me,  raise 
their  right  hands  in  salutation  and  deliv- 
er themselves  of  a  little  speech,  of  which 
this  is  as  close  a  translation  as  it  is  pos- 
sible to  get  of  so  dissimilar  a  language : 
"  Messages  were  sent  to  us  at  our  kraals 
that  an  English  lady  wished  to  see  us 
and  witness  our  customs.  When  we 
heard  these  messages  our  hearts  said, 
1  Go  to  the  English  lady.'  So  we  have 
come,  and  now  our  hearts  are  filled  with 
pleasure  at  having  seen  this  lady,  and 
ourselyes  heard  her  express  her  thanks 
to  us.  We  would  also,  on  our  part,  thank 
the  lady  for  her  kindness  and  her  pres- 
ents. White  people  do  not  believe  in  our 
powers,  and  think  that  we  are  mad ;  but 
still  we  know  it  is  not  so,  and  that  we 
really  have  the  powers  we  profess.  So 
it  comes  that  we  are  proud  this  day  at 
being  allowed  to  show  ourselves  before 
our  great  white  chief  and  so  many  great 
white  people.  We  thank  the  lady  again ; 

and  say  for  us,  O  son  of  Mr.  F !  that 

we  wish  her  ever  to  dwell  in  peace,  and 
we  desire  for  her  that  her  path  may  have 
light."  It  was  not  easy  to  find  anything 
equally  pretty  to  say  in  return  for  this,  but 
I,  in  my  turn,  invoked  the  ready  wit  and 

fluent  tongue  of  the  "  son  of  Mr.  F ," 

and  I  dare  say  he  turned  out,  as  if  from 
me,  something  very  neat  and  creditable. 
So  we  were  all  mutually  pleased  with 
each  other  ;  only  I  was  haunted  all  the 
time  of  this  pretty  speech-making  by  the 
recollection  of  a  quaint  saying,  often  used 
by  a  funny  old  Scotch  nurse  we  had  when 
we  were  children  :  I  don't  think  I  have 
ever  heard  it  since,  but  it  darted  into  my 
mind  with  my  first  platitude  :  "  When 
gentlefolks  meet  compliments  pass." 
We  were  all  anxious  to  outdo  each  oth- 
er in  politeness,  but  unless  my  niaiserics 
gained  a  good  deal  by  being  changed 
into  Zulu,  I  fear  the  witch-finders  did 
the  best  in  that  line. 


The  twilight,  sadly  short  now,  was  fast 
coming  on,  and  all  the  black  people  were 
anxious  to  get  back  to  their  homes.  Al- 
ready the  crowd  of  spectators  had  melted 
away  like  magic,  streaming  down  the 
green  hillsides  by  many  a  different  track : 
only  a  remnant  of  the  body-guard  linger- 
ed to  escort  the  performers  home.  As 
they  passed  the  corner  of  the  verandah 
where  the  tea-table  was  set,  I  fancied 
they  glanced  wistfully  at  the  cakes  ;  so 
I  rather  timidly  handed  a  substantial  bis- 
cuit, as  big  as  a  saucer,  to  the  huge  No- 
zinyanga,  who  graciously  accepted  it  as 
joyfully  as  a  child  would.  Another  little 
black  hand  was  thrust  out  directly,  and 
yet  another,  and  so  the  end  was  that  the 
tea-tables  were  cleared,  then  and  there, 
of  all  the  eatables ;  and  it  was  not  until  ev- 
ery dish  was  empty  that  the  group  moved 
on,  raising  a  parting  cry  of  "  Inkosa 
casa !"  and  a  sort  of  cheer  or  attempt  at 
a  cheer.  They  were  so  unfeignedly  de- 
lighted with  this  sudden  "  happy  thought" 
about  the  cakes  and  biscuits  that  it  was 
quite  a  pleasure  to  see  them,  so  good- 
humored  and  docile,  moving  off  the  mo- 
ment they  saw  I  really  had  exhausted  my 
store,  with  pretty  gestures  of  gratitude  and 
thanks.  We  had  to  content  ourselves  with 
bread  and  butter  with  our  second  cups 
of  tea,  but  we  were  so  tired  and  thirsty, 
and  so  glad  of  a  little  rest  and  quiet,  that 
I  don't  think  we  missed  the  cakes. 

As  we  sat  there  enjoying  the  last  love- 
ly gleams  of  daylight  and  chatting  over 
the  strange,  weird  scene,  we  could  just 
hear  the  distant  song  of  the  escort  as  they 
took  the  tired  priestesses  home,  and  we 
all  fell  to  talking  of  the  custom  when  it 
was  in  all  its  savage  force.  Many  of  the 
friends  present  had  seen  or  heard  terri- 
ble instances  of  the  wholesale  massacre 
which  wo~uld  have  followed  just  such  an 
exhibition  as  this  had  it  been  in  earnest. 
But  I  will  repeat  for  you  some  of  the  less 
ghastly  stories.  One  shall  be  modern 
and  one'  ancient  —  as  ancient  as  half  a 
century  ago,  which  is  ancient  for  modern 
tradition.  The  modern  one  is  the  tamest, 
so  it  shall  come  first. 

Before  the  law  was  passed  making 
it  wrong  to  consult  these  Izinyanga  or 
witch-doctors  a  servant  belonging  to  one 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


of  the  English  settlers  lost  his  savings, 
some  three  or  four  pounds.  He  sus- 
pected one  of  his  fellow-servants  of  be- 
ing the  thief,  summoned  the  Izinyanga, 
and  requested  his  master  to  "  assist "  at 
the  ceremony.  All  the  other  servants 
were  bidden  to  assemble  themselves,  and 
to  do  exactly  what  the  witch-finder  bade 
them.  She  had  them  seated  in  a  row  in 
front  of  her,  and  ordered  them,  one  and 
all,  to  bare  their  throats  and  chests,  for, 
you  must  remember,  they  were  clothed 
as  the  law  obliges  them  to  be  in  the 
towns  —  in  a  shirt  and  knickerbockers. 
This  they  did,  the  guilty  one  with  much 
trepidation,  you  may  be  sure,  and  she 
fixed  her  eyes  on  that  little  hollow  in  the 
neck  where  the  throat  joins  the  body, 
watching  carefully  the  accelerated  pul- 
sation :  "  It  is  thou :  no,  it  is  not.  It  must 
then  be  you  ;"^and  so  on,  dodging  about, 
pointing  first  to  one,  and  then  rapidly 
wheeling  round  to  fix  on  another,  until 
the  wretched  criminal  was  so  nervous 
that  when  she  made  one  of  her  sudden 
descents  upon  him,  guided  by  the  be- 
wraying pulse,  which  fluttered  and  throb- 
bed with  anxiety  and  terror,  he  was  fain 
to  throw  up  his  hands  and  confess,  pray- 
ing for  mercy.  In  this  case  the  Izin- 
yanga was  merely  a  shrewd,  observant 
woman  with  a  strong  spice  of  the  detec- 
tive in  her;  but  they  are  generally  re- 
garded not  only  as  sorceresses,  whose 
superior  incantations  can  discover  and 
bring  to  light  the  machinations  of  the 
ordinary  witch,  but  as  priestesses  of  a 
dark  and  obscure  faith. 

The  other  instance  of  their  discern- 
ment we  talked  of  happened  some  fifty 
years  ago,  when  Chaka  the  Terrible  was 
king  of  the  Zulus.  The  political  power 
of  these  Izinyanga  had  then  reached  a 
great  height  in  Zululand,  and  they  were 
in  the  habit  of  denouncing  as  witches — 
or  rather  wizards — one  after  the  other  of 
the  king's  ministers  and  chieftains.  It 
was  difficult  to  put  a  stop  to  these  whole- 
sale murders,  for  the  sympathy  of  the 
people  was  always  on  the  side  of  the 
witch-finders,  cruel  though  they  were. 
At  last  the  king  thought  of  an  expedient. 
He  killed  a  bullock,  and  with  his  own 


hands  smeared  its  blood  over  the  royal 
hut  in  the  dead  of  night.  Next  day  he 
summoned  a  council,  and  announced 
that  some  one  had  been  guilty  of  high 
treason  in  defiling  the  king's  hut  with 
blood,  and  that,  too,  when  it  stood,  ap- 
parently secure  from  outrage,  in  the  very 
middle  of  the  kraal.  What  was  to  be 
done  ?  The  Izinyanga  were  summoned, 
and  commanded,  on  pain  of  death,  to  de- 
clare who  was  the  criminal.  This  they 
were  quite  ready  to  do,  and  named  with- 
out hesitation  one  after  another  the  great 
inkosi  who  sat  trembling  around.  But 
instead  of  dooming  the  wretched  victim 
to  death,  the  denouement  closely  resem- 
bled that  of  the  famous  elegy:  "The 
dog  it  was  that  died."  In  other  words, 
the  witch-finders  who  named  an  inkosi 
heard  to  their  astonishment  that  they 
were  to  be  executed  and  the  denounced 
victim  kept  alive.  This  went  on  for  some 
time,  until  one,  cleverer  than  the  rest,  and 
yet  afraid  of  committinghimself  too  much, 
rose  up  and  said  oracularly,  "  I  smell  the 
heavens  above."  Chaka  took  this  as  a 
compliment,  as  well  as  a  guess  in  the  right 
direction,  ordered  all  the  remaining  Izin- 
yanga to  be  slain  on  the  spot,  and  ap- 
pointed the  fortunate  oracle  to  be  his  one 
and  only  witch-finder  for  ever  after. 

Chaka's  name  will  be  remembered  for 
many  and  many  a  day  in  Zululand  and 
the  provinces  which  border  it  by  both 
black  and  white.  In  the  first  decade  of 
this  century,  when  Napoleon  was  mapping 
out  Europe  afresh  with  the  bayonet  for  a 
stylus,  and  we  were  pouring  out  blood 
and  money  like  water  to  check  him  here 
and  there — at  that  very  time  Ranpehera 
in  New  Zealand  and  Chaka  in  Zululand 
were  playing  a  precisely  similar  game. 
Here,  Chaka  had  a  wider  field  for  his 
Alexander -like  rage  for  conquest,  and 
he  and  his  wild  warriors  dashed  over  the 
land  like  a  mountain-stream.  No  place 
was  safe  from  him,  and  he  was  the  terror 
of  the  unhappy  first  settlers.  Even  now 
his  name  brings  a  sense  of  uneasiness 
with  it,  for  it  is  still  a  spell  to  rouse  the 
warrior-spirit,  which  only  sleeps  in  the 
breasts  of  his  wild  subjects  across  the 
border. 


MARITZBURG,  May  10,  1876 

N'  O,  I  will  not  begin  about  the  weather 
this  time.  It  is  a  great  temptation 
to  do  so,  because  this  is  the  commence- 
ment of  the  winter,  and  it  is  upon  the 
strength  of  the  coming  four  months  that 
the  reputation  of  Natal,  as  possessing  the 
finest  climate  in  the  world,  is  built.  Be- 
fore I  came  here  meteorologists  used  to 
tell  me  that  the  "average"  temperature 
of  Maritzburg  was  so  and  so,  mention- 
ing something  very  equable  and  pleas- 
ant; but  then,  you  see,  there  is  this  little 
difference  between  weather-theories  and 
the  practice  of  the  weather  itself:  it  is 
sadly  apt  to  rush  into  extremes,  and  de- 
grees of  heat  and  cold  are  very  different 
when  totted  up  and  neatly  spread  over 
many  weeks,  from  the  same  thing  bolted 
in  lumps.  Then  you  don't  catch  cold  on 
paper,  nor  live  in  doubt  whether-to  have 
a  fire  or  open  windows  and  doors.  To 
keep  at  all  on  a  level  with  the  thermom- 
eter here,  one  needs  to  dress  three  or  four 
times  a  day ;  and  it  is  quite  on  the  cards 
that  a  muslin  gown  and  sealskin  jacket 
may  both  be  pleasant  wear  on  the  same 
day.  We  have  all  got  colds,  and,  what 
is  worse,  we  have  all  had  colds  more 
or  less  badly  for  some  time  past;  and  I 
hear  that  everybody  else  has  them  too. 
Of  course,  this  news  is  an  immense  con- 
solation, else  why  should  it  invariably 
be  mentioned  as  a  compensation  for 
one's  own  paroxysms  of  sneezing  and 
coughing  ? 

It  is  certainly  cooler,  at  times  quite 
cold,  but  the  sudden  spasms  of  fierce 
hot  winds  and  the  blazing  sun  during 
the  midday  hours  appear  the  more  with- 
ering and  scorching  for  the  contrast  with 
the  lower  temperature  of  morning  and 
evening.  Still,  we  all  keep  saying  (I 
yet  protest  against  the  formula,  but  I've 
no  doubt  I  shall  come  round  presently 
and  join  heart  and  soul  in  it),  "  Natal  has 
the  finest  climate  in  the  world,"  although 
we  have  to  go  about  like  the  man  in  the 


fable,  and  either  wrap  our  cloaks  tightly 
around  us  or  throw  them  wide  open  to 
breathe.  But  there  !  I  said  I  would  not 
go  off  into  a  meteorological  report,  and 
I  will  not  be  beguiled  by  the  attractions 
of  a  grievance — for  there  is  no  such  satis- 
factory grievance  as  weather — into  break- 
ing so  good  a  resolution.  Rather  let  me 
graft  upon  this  monotonous  weather- 
grumble  a  laugh  at  the  expense  of  poor 
Zulu  Jack,  whom  I  found  the  other  morn- 
ing in  a  state  of  nervous  anxiety  over  the 
butter,  which  steadily  refused  to  be  spread 
on  'a  slice  of  bread  for  little  G 's  con- 
sumption. "  Have  you  such  a  thing  as  a 
charm  about  you,  lady-chief?"  Jack  de- 
manded in  fluent  Zulu ;  "  for  this  butter 
is  assuredly  bewitched.  Last  night  I 
could  make  slices  of  buttered  bread 
quite  easily :  this  morning,  behold  it !" 
and  he  exhibited  his  ill-used  slice  of 
bread,  with  obstinate  and  isolated  dabs 
of  butter  sticking  about  it.  So,  you  see, 
it  must  be  cooler;  and  so  it  is,  I  acknow- 
ledge, except  of  a  morning  on  which  a  hot 
wind  sets  in  before  sunrise. 

To  show  you  how  perfectly  impartial 
and  unprejudiced  even  a  woman  can  be, 
I  am  going  to  admit  that  the  day  last 
week  on  which  I  took  a  long  ride  to 
Edendale — a  mission-station  some  half 
dozen  miles  away — was  as  absolutely  de- 
lightful as  a  day  could  well  be.  It  was  a 
gray,  shady  day,  very  rare  beneath  these 
sunny  skies,  for  clouds  generally  mean 
rain  or  fog,  but  this  day  they  meant  noth- 
ing worse  than  the  tiniest  sprinkle  at 
sundown — just  a  few  big  drops  flirted  in 
our  faces  from  the  ragged  edge  of  a  swift- 
ly-sailing thundercloud.  There  was  no 
wind  to  stir  up  the  dust,  and  yet  air 
enough  to  be  quite  delicious:  now  and 
then  the  sun  came  out  from  behind  the 
friendly  clouds,  creating  exquisite  effects 
of  light  and  shadow  among  the  hills 
through  which  our  road  wound.  Across 
many  a  little  tributary  of  the  Umsindusi, 
by  many  a  still  green  valley  and  round 
79 


So 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


many  a  rocky  hill-shoulder,  our  road  lay 
— a  road  which  for  me  was  most  pleasant- 
ly beguiled  by  stories  of  Natal  as  it  was 
five-and-twenty  years  ago,  when  lions 
came  down  to  drink  at  these  streams, 
when  these  very  plains  were  thickly 
studded  with  buck  and  eland,  buffalo 
and  big  game  whose  names  would  be  a 
treasure  of  puzzledom  to  a  spelling  bee. 
In  those  days  no  man's  hand  ever  left 
for  an  instant  the  lock  of  his  trusty  gun, 
sleeping  or  waking,  standing  or  sitting, 
eating  or  riding. 

The  great  want  of  ever  so  fair  a  land- 
scape in  these  parts  is  timber.  Here  and 
there  a  deeper  shadow  in  the  distant  hill- 
clefts  may  mean  a  patch  of  scrub,  but 
when  once  you  pass  the  belt  of  farms 
which  girdle  Maritzburg  for  some  four 
or  five  miles  in  every  direction,  and 
leave  behind  their  plantations  of  gums 
and  poplars,  oaks  and  willows,  then  there 
is  nothing  more  to  be  seen  but  rolling  hill- 
slopes  bare  of  bush  or  shrub,  until  the  eye 
is  caught  by  the  trees  around  the  settle- 
ment we  are  on  our  way  to  visit.  It 
stands  quite  far  back  among  the  hills — 
too  much  under  their  lee,  in  fact,  to  be 
quite  healthy,  I  should  fancy,  for  a  layer 
of  chilly,  vaporous  air  always  lurks  at  the 
bottom  of  these  folded -away  valleys, 
and  breeds  colds  and  fever  and  ague. 
Still,  it  is  all  inexpressibly  homelike  and 
fertile  as  it  lies  there  nestling  up  against 
the  high,  rising  ground,  with  patches  of 
mealies  spread  in  a  green  fan  around  and 
following  the  course  of  the  winding  river 
in  tall  green  rustling  brakes  like  sugar- 
cane. The  road,  a  fairly  good  one  for 
Natal,  was  strangely  still  and  silent,  and 
bereft  of  sight  or  sound  of  animal  life. 
At  one  of  the  spruits  a  couple  of  timber- 
wagons  were  outspanned,  and  the  jaded, 
tick-covered  bullocks  gave  but  little  ani- 
mation to  the  scene.  Farther  on,  whilst 
we  cantered  easily  along  over  a  wide 
plain  still  rich  in  grass,  a  beautiful  little 
falcon  swept  across  our  path.  Slow  and 
low  was  its  flight,  quite  as  though  it  neith- 
er feared  nor  cared  for  us,  and  I  had  am- 
ple time  to  admire  its  exquisite  plumage 
and  its  large  keen  eye.  By  and  by  we 
came  upon  the  usual  "  groups  from  the 
antique"  in  bronze  and  ebony  working 


at  the  road,  and,  as  usual,  doing  rather 
more  harm  than  good.  But  when  we 
had  crossed  the  last  streamlet  and  turn- 
ed into  a  sort  of  avenue  which  led  to  the 
main  street  of  the  settlement,  then  there 
was  life  and  movement  enough  and  to 
spare.  Forth  upon  the  calm  air  rang 
the  merry  voices  of  children,  of  women 
carrying  on  laughing  dialogues  across 
the  street,  and  of  men's  deeper -toned 
but  quite  as  fluent  jabber.  And  here 
are  the  speakers  themselves  as  we  leave 
the  shade  of  the  trees  and  come  out  upon 
the  wide  street  rising  up  before  us  toward 
the  mountain-slope  which  ends  its  vista. 

Sitting  at  the  doors  of  their  houses  are 
tidy,  comfortable-looking  men  and  wo- 
men, the  former  busy  plaiting  with  deft 
and  rapid  movement  of  their  little  fin- 
gers neat  baskets  and  mats  of  reeds  and 
rushes — the  latter  either  cooking  mealies, 
shelling  them  or  crushing  them  for  the 
market.  Everywhere  are  mealies  and 
children.  Fat  black  babies  squat  hap- 
pily in  the  dust,  munching  the  boiled 
husk  before  it  is  shelled  ;  older  children 
are  eqCially  happy  cleaning  with  finger 
and  tongue  a  big  wooden  spoon  just  out 
of  the  porridge- pot ;  whilst  this  same  fa- 
miliar pot,  of  every  conceivable  size,  but 
always  of  the  same  three-legged  shape, 
something  like  a  gypsy-kettle,  lurks  more 
or  less  en  evidence  in  the  neighborhood  of 
every  house.  No  grass-thatched  huts  are 
here,  but  thoroughly  nice,  respectable  lit- 
tle houses,  nearly  all  of  the  same  simple 
pattern,  with  vermilion  or  yellow-ochre 
doors,  and  half  covered  with  creepers. 
Whoever  despairs  of  civilizing  the  Kafir 
need  only  look  here  and  at  other  simi- 
lar stations  to  see  how  easily  he  adapts 
himself  to  comfortable  ways  and  cus- 
toms, and  in  what  a  decent,  orderly  fash- 
ion he  can  be  trained  to  live  with  his 
fellows. 

Edendale  is  a  Wesleyan  mission-sta- 
tion, and  the  history  of  its  settlement 
is  rather  a  curious  one — curious  from  its 
being  the  result  of  no  costly  organiza- 
tion, no  elaborate  system  of  proselytism, 
but  the  work  of  one  man  originally,  and 
the  evident  result  and  effect  of  a  percep- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  natives  of  the 
benefits  of  association  and  civilization. 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


Si 


And  here  I  feel  it  incumbent  on  me  to 
bear  testimony — not  only  in  this  instance 
and  in  this  colony  —  to  the  enormous 
amount  of  real,  tangible,  common-sense 
good  accomplished  among  the  black 
races  all  over  the  world  by  both  Wesley- 
an  Methodist  and  Baptist  missions  and 
missionaries.  I  am  a  staunch  Church- 
woman  myself,  and  yield  to  no  one  in 
pure  love  and  reverence  for  my  own 
form  of  worship ;  but  I  do  not  see  why 
that  should  hinder  me  from  acknowledg- 
ing facts  which  I  have  noticed  all  my 
life.  Long  ago  in  Jamaica,  how  often  in 
our  girlish  rambles  and  rides  have  my 
sister  and  I  come  suddenly  upon  a  little 
clearing  in  the  midst  of  the  deep  silence 
and  green  gloom  of  a  tropical  forest! 
In  the  centre  of  the  clearing  would  be 
a  rude  thatched  barn,  with  felled  trees 
for  seats,  and  neither  door  nor  window. 
"What  is  that?"  we  would  ask  of  the 
negro  lad  who  always  rode  on  a  mule 
behind  us  to  open  gates  or  tell  us  the 
right  road  home  again  after  an  excursion 
in  search  of  rare  orchids  or  parrots'  nests. 
"  Dat  Baptist  chapel,  missis.  Wesleyan, 
him  hab  chapel  too  ober  dere.  Sunday 
good  man  come  preach  —  tell  us  poor 
niggers  all  good  tings.  Oder  days  same 
good  gempleman  teach  pickaninnies." 
That  was  the  answer,  and  in  those  few 
words  would  lie  the  history  of  much 
patient,  humble  planting  of  good  seed, 
unnoticed  by  the  more  pompous  world 
around.  The  minister  works  perhaps 
during  the  week  at  some  means  of  sup- 
port, but  devotes  even  his  scant  leisure 
moments  to  teaching  the  little  black  chil- 
dren. I  am  so  ignorant  of  the  details  on 
which  dissenters  differ  from  us  that  I  dare 
not  go  into  the  subject,  but  I  only  know 
it  was  the  same  thing  in  India.  Up  in 
the  Himalayas  I  have  come  across  just 
the  same  story  scores  of  times.  Whilst 
our  more  costly  and  elaborate  system 
of  organization  is  compelled  to  wait  for 
grants  and  certified  teachers,  and  desks 
and  benches,  and  Heaven  knows  what, 
the  Methodist  or  Baptist  missionary 
fells  a  few  trees,  uses  them  as  walls  and 
seats,  thatches  the  roof  of  his  shelter, 
and  begins  then  and  there  to  teach  the 
people  around  him  something  of  the 
6 


sweet  charities  and  decencies  of  a  Chris- 
tian life. 

Doubtless,  Edendale  had  once  upon  a 
time  as  humble  a  beginning,  but  when  I 
saw  it  that  soft  autumn  day  it  was  dif- 
ficult to  recall  such  a  chrysalis  stage  of 
its  existence.  On  our  right  hand  rose  a 
neat  brick  chapel,  substantial  and  hand- 
some enough  in  its  way,  with  proper  seats 
and  good  woodwork  within.  This  plain 
structure,  however,  cost  something  over 
a  thousand  pounds,  nearly  every  penny 
of  which  has  been  contributed  by  Kafirs, 
who  twenty-five  years  ago  had  probably 
never  seen  a  brick  or  a  bench,  and  were 
in  every  respect  as  utter  savages  as  you 
could  find  anywhere.  Nor  is  this  the  only 
place  of  worship  or  instruction  on  the  es- 
tate, although  it  is  the  largest  and  most 
expensive,  for  within  the  limits  of  the 
settlement,  or  "location,"  as  it  is  called 
— only  embracing,  remember,  some  thir- 
ty-five hundred  acres  under  cultivation 
— there  is  another  chapel,  a  third  a  few 
miles  farther  off  at  a  sort  of  out-station, 
and  no  less  than  four  day-schools  with 
two  hundred  scholars,  and  three  Sunday- 
schools  at  which  two  hundred  and  eighty 
children  assemble  weekly.  All  the  neces- 
sary buildings  for  these  purposes  have 
been  created  entirely  by  and  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  natives,  who  only  number 
eight  hundred  residents  in  the  village  it- 
self. On  Sundays,  however,  I  heard  with 
much  pleasure  that  more  than  a  hun- 
dred natives  from  neighboring  kraals  at- 
tend the  services  at  the  chapels,  attracted 
no  doubt  in  the  first  instance  by  the  sing- 
ing. But  still,  one  cannot  have  a  better 
beginning,  and  the  Kafir  is  quite  shrewd 
enough  to  contrast  his  squalid  hut,  his 
scanty  covering  and  monotonous  food 
with  the  well-clad,  well-housed,  well-fed 
members  of  the  little  community  of  whom 
he  catches  this  weekly  glimpse,  and  ev- 
ery one  of  whom,  save  their  pastor,  is  as 
black  as  himself. 

But  I  promised  to  tell  you  briefly  how 
the  little  settlement  first  originated.  Its 
founder  and  organizer  was  the  Rev.  James 
Allison,  a  Wesleyan  missionary  who  la- 
bored long  and  successfully  among  the 
Basuto  and  Amaswazi  tribes  in  the  inte- 
rior, far  away.  Circumstances,  external 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


as  well  as  private,  into  which  I  need  not 
enter,  led  to  his  purchasing  from  Preto- 
rius,  the  old  Dutch  president  of  Natal, 
this  "location"  or  estate  of  some  sixty- 
five  hundred  acres  in  extent,  and  settling 
himself  upon  it.  He  was  followed  by  a 
great  many  of  his  original  flock,  who 
were  warmly  and  personally  attached 
to  him,  and  had  faithfully  shared  his 
fortunes  in  the  past.  In  this  way  the 
nucleus  of  a  settlement  lay  ready  to  his 
hand,  and  he  seems  to  have  been  a  man 
of  great  business  talents  and  practical 
turn  of  mind,  as  well  as  a  spiritual  teach- 
er of  no  mean  ability.  The  little  village 
I  saw  the  other  day  was  quickly  laid  out, 
and  the  small  freehold  lots — or  "craen," 
as  they  are  called  still  by  their  old  Dutch 
name — were  readily  bought  by  the  na- 
tive settlers.  This  was  only  in  1851,  and 
probably  the  actual  tillage  of  the  soil  was 
not  commenced  for  a  year  or  two  later. 
As  we  walked  through  the  fertile  fields 
with  their  rich  and  abundant  crops  stand- 
ing ready  for  the  sickle,  and  looked  down 
into  the  sheltered  nooks  where  luxuriant 
gardens  full  of  vegetables  flourished,  it 
was  difficult  to  believe  that  ever  since 
the  first  blade  of  grass  or  corn  was  put 
in  till  now  those  fields  had  never  known 
any  artificial  dressing  or  manuring  of 
any  sort.  For  more  than  twenty  years 
the  soil  had  yielded  abundantly  without 
an  hour's  rest,  or  any  further  cultiva- 
tion than  a  very  light  plough  could  give. 
The  advantages  of  irrigation,  so  shame- 
fully overlooked  elsewhere,  were  here 
abundantly  recognized,  and  every  few 
yards  brought  one  to  a  diminutive  chan- 
nel, made  by  a  hoe  in  a  few  minutes, 
bearing  from  the  hill  above  a  bright 
trickle  down  to  the  gardens  and  houses. 
I  confess  I  often  thought  during  that 
pleasant  ramble  of  the  old  saying  about 
God  helping  those  who  help  themselves, 
for  all  the  comfort  and  well-to-do-ness 
which  met  my  eyes  every  moment  was 
entirely  from  within.  The  people  had 
done  everything  with  their  own  hands, 
and  during  the  past  year  had,  besides, 
contributed  over  two  hundred  pounds  to 
their  minister's  support.  There  have 
been  three  or  four  pastoral  successors  to 
Mr.  Allison,  who  left  the  settlement  about 


a  dozen  years  ago,  and  the  minister,  who 
offered  me,  a  complete  stranger,  a  most 
cordial  and  kindly  welcome,  showing  me 
everything  which  could  interest  me,  and 
readily  falling  in  with  my  desire  to  un- 
derstand it  all,  was  the  Rev.  Daniel  Eva, 
who  has  only  been  in  charge  of  this 
mission  for  eighteen  months.  I  was 
much  struck  by  his  report  of  the  clever- 
ness of  the  native  children  ;  only  it  made 
one  regret  still  more  that  they  had  not 
better  and  greater  opportunities  all  over 
the  colony  of  being  taught  and  trained. 
In  the  girls'  school  I  saw  a  bright-eyed 
little  Kafir  maiden,  neatly  dressed  and 
with  the  most  charming  graceful  carriage 
and  manner,  who  was  only  twelve  years 
old,  and  the  most  wonderful  arithmeti- 
cian. She  had  passed  her  teacher  long 
ago,  and  was  getting  through  her  "  frac- 
tions "  with  the  ease  and  rapidity  of  Bab- 
bage's  calculating  -  machine.  Nothing 
short  of  Euclid  was  at  all  likely  to  satis- 
fy her  appetite  for  figures.  She  and  her 
slate  were  inseparable,  and,  she  liked 
nothing  better  than  helping  the  other 
children  with  their  sums.  But,  indeed, 
they  were  all  very  forward  with  their 
learning,  and  did  their  native  teachers 
great  credit:  What  I  longed  for,  more 
than  anything  else,  was  to  see  a  regular 
training-school  established  in  this  and 
similar  stations  where  these  clever  little 
monkeys  could  be  trained  as  future  do- 
mestic servants  for  us  whites,  and  as  good, 
knowledgeable  wives  for  their  own  peo- 
ple. There  was  for  some  years  an  in- 
dustrial school  here,  and  I  was  dreadful- 
ly sorry  to  hear  it  had  been  given  up,  but 
not  before  it  had  turned  out  some  very 
creditable  artisans  among  the  boys,  all  of 
whom  are  doing  well  at  their  respective 
trades  and  earning  their  five  or  six  shil- 
lings a  day  as  skilled  workmen.  This 
school  used  to  receive  a  yearly  grant  from 
the  local  government  of  one  hundred 
pounds,  but  when,  from  private  reasons,  it 
was  given  up,  the  grant  was  of  course  with- 
drawn. The  existing  schools  only  get  a 
government  grant  of  fifty  pounds  a  year ; 
and,  small  as  the  sum  seems,  it  is  yet 
difficult  to  expect  more  from  a  heavily- 
taxed  white  population  who  are  at  this 
moment  busy  in  preparing  a  better  and 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


more  costly  scheme  of  education  than 
they  possess  at  present  for  their  own 
children.  Still,  I  confess  my  heart  was 
much  drawn  to  this  cheerful,  struggling 
little  community  ;  and  not  only  to  it,  but 
to  its  numerous  offshoots  scattered  here 
and  there  far  away.  The  Edendale  peo- 
ple already  look  forward  to  the  days 
when  they  shall  have  outgrown  their 
present  limits,  and  have  purchased  two 
very  large  farms  a  hundred  miles  farther 
in  the  interior,  to  which  several  of  the 
original  settlers  of  the  parent  mission 
have  migrated,  and  so  formed  a  fresh 
example  of  thrift  and  industry  and  a 
fresh  nucleus  of  civilization  in  another 
wild  part. 

There  were  a  hundred  houses  in  the 
village  (it  is  called  George  Town,  after 
Sir  George  Grey),  and  into  some  of  these 
houses  I  went  by  special  and  eager  invi- 
tation of  the  owners.  You  have  no  idea 
how  clean  and  comfortable  they  were, 
nor  what  a  good  notion  of  decoration 
civilized  Kafirs  have.  In  fact,  there  was 
rather  too  much  decoration,  as  you  will 
admit  if  I  describe  one  dwelling  to  you. 
This  particular  house  stood  on  high 
ground,  just  where  the  mountain  slopes 
abruptly,  so  it  had  a  little  terrace  in  front 
to  make  the  ground  level.  Below  the  ter- 
race was  a  kind  of  yard,  in  which  quan- 
tities of  fowls  scratched  and  clucked,  and 
beyond  that,  again,  an  acre  of  garden- 
ground,  every  part  of  which  was  plant- 
ed with  potatoes,  pumpkins,  green  peas 
and  other  things.  A  couple  of  somewhat 
steep  and  rough  steps  helped  us  to  mount 
up  on  the  terrace,  and  then  we  were  usher- 
ed— with  such  a  natural  pride  and  delight 
in  a  white  lady  visitor — into  a  little  flag- 
ged passage.  On  one  side  was  the 
kitchen  and  living-room,  a  fair -sized 
place  enough,  with  substantial  tables 
and  chairs,  and  a  large  open  hearth, 
on  which  a  wood-fire  was  cooking  the 
savory  contents  of  a  big  pot.  As  for  the 
walls,  they  were  simply  the  gayest  I  ever 
beheld.  Originally  whitewashed,  they 
had  been  absolutely  covered  with  bril- 
liant designs  in  vermilion,  cobalt  and 
yellow  ochre,  most  correctly  and  sym- 
metrically drawn  in  geometrical  figures. 
A  many-colored  star  within  a  circle  was 


a  favorite  pattern.  The  effect  was  as 
dazzling  as  though  a  kaleidoscope  had 
been  suddenly  flung  against  a  wall  and 
its  gay  shapes  fixed  on  it.  But,  grand  as 
was  this  apartment,  it  faded  into  insig- 
nificance compared  to  the  drawing-room 
and  the  "English  bedroom,"  both  of 
which  were  exhibited  to  me  with  much 
complacency  by  the  smiling  owner.  Now, 
these  rooms  had  originally  been  one,  and 
were  only  divided  by  a  slender  partition- 
wall.  When  the  door  of  the  drawing- 
room  was  thrown  open,  I  must  say  I 
almost  jumped  back  in  alarm  at  the  size 
of  the  roses  and  lilies  which  seemed 
about  to  assault  me.  I  never  before  saw 
such  a  wall-paper — never.  It  would  have 
been  a  large  pattern  for,  say,  St.  James's 
Hall,  and  there  it  was,  flaunting  on  walls 
about  seven  feet  by  eight.  A  brilliant 
crimson  flock  formed  the  ground,  and 
these  alarming  flowers,  far  larger  than 
life,  bloomed  and  nodded  all  over  it. 
The  chairs  and  sofa  were  gay  with  an 
equally  remarkable  chintz,  and  brilliant 
mats  of  beads  and  wool  adorned  the 
tables.  China  ornaments  and  pictures 
were  in  profusion,  though  it  took  time 
to  get  accustomed  to  those  roses  and 
lilies,  so  as  to  be  able  to  perceive  any- 
thing else.  In  one  part  of  the  tiny 
room  some  bricks  had  been  taken  out 
of  the  wall  and  a  recess  formed,  fitted 
up  with  shelves  on  which  stood  more 
vases  and  statuettes,  the  whole  being 
framed  and  draped  with  pink  calico  cut 
in  large  Vandykes.  I  must  say,  my 
black  hostess  and  her  numerous  female 
friends,  who  came  flocking  to  see  me, 
stood  out  well  against  this  magnificent 
background.  We  all  sat  for  some  time 
exchanging  compliments  and  personal 
remarks  through  the  medium  of  an  in- 
terpreter. But  one  smiling  sable  under- 
stood English,  and  it  was  she  who  pro- 
posed that  the  "lady-chief"  should  now 
be  shown  the  bedroom,  which  was  Eng- 
lish fashion.  We  all  flocked  into  it,  gen- 
tlemen and  all,  for  it  was  too  amusing  to 
be  left  out.  Sure  enough,  there  was  a 
gay  iron  bedstead,  a  chest  of  drawers, 
and,  crowning  glory  of  all,  a  real  dress- 
ing-table, complete  with  pink  and  white 
petticoat  and  toilette-glass.  The  glass 


84 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


might  have  been  six  inches  square — I 
don't  think  it  was  more — but  there  was 
a  great  deal  of  wooden  frame  to  it,  and 
it  stood  among  half  a  dozen  breakfast 
cups  and  saucers  which  were  symmetri- 
cally arranged,  upside  down,  on  the  toi- 
lette-table. 

"What  are  these  for?"  I  asked  inno- 
cently. 

"  Dat  English  fashion,  missis :  all 
white  ladies  hab  cup-saucers  on  deir 
tables  like  dat." 

It  would  have  been  the  worst  possible 
taste  to  throw  any  doubt  on  this  asser- 
tion, which  we  all  accepted  with  perfect 
gravity  and  good  faith,  and  so  returned 
to  the  drawing-room,  much  impressed, 
apparently,  by  the  grandeur  of  the  bed- 
room. 

Of  course,  the  babies  came  swarming 
round,  and  very  fat  and  jolly  they  all 
looked  in  their  nice  cotton  frocks  or 
shirt-blouses.  I  did  not  see  a  single  rag- 
ged or  squalid  or  poverty-stricken  person 
in  the  whole  settlement,  except  one  poor 
mad  boy,  who  followed  us  about,  darting 
behind  some  shelter  whenever  he  fancied 
himself  observed.  Poor  fellow  !  he  was 
quite  harmless — a  lucky  circumstance,  for 
he  was  of  enormous  stature  and  strength. 
Over  his  pleasant  countenance  came  a 
puzzled,  vacant  look  every  now  and  then, 
but  nothing  repulsive,  though  his  shaggy 
locks  hung  about  his  face  like  a  water- 
spaniel's  ears,  and  he  was  only  wrapped 
in  a  coarse  blanket.  I  was  sorry  to  no- 
tice a  good  deal  of  ophthalmia  among 
the  children,  and  heard  that  it  was  often 
prevalent  here. 

In^another  house,  not  quite  so  gay,  I 
was  specially  invited  to  look  at  the  con- 
tents of  the  good  wife's  wardrobe,  hung 
out  to  air  in  the  garden.  She  was  huge- 
ly delighted  at  my  declaring  that  I  should 
like  to  borrow  some  of  her  smart  gowns, 
especially  when  I  assured  her,  with  per- 
fect truth,  that  I  did  not  possess  anything 
half  so  fine.  Sundry  silk  dresses  of  hues 
like  the  rainbow  waved  from  the  pome- 
granate bushes,  and  there  were  mantles 
and  jackets  enough  to  have  started  a 
second-hand  clothes'  shop  on  the  spot. 
This  young  woman — who  was  quite  pret- 
ty, by  the  way  —  was  the  second  wife 


of  a  rich  elderly  man,  and  I  wonder- 
ed what  her  slight,  petite  figure  would 
look  like  when  buried  in  those  large  and 
heavy  garments.  It  chanced  to  be  Sat- 
urday, and  there  was  quite  as  much  clean- 
ing and  general  furbishing  up  of  every- 
thing going  on  inside  and  outside  the  lit- 
tle houses  as  in  an  English  country  vil- 
lage, and  far  less  shrewishness  over  the 
process. 

I  wanted  to  have  one  more  look  at 
the  principal  school-room,  whose  scholars 
were  just  breaking  up  for  a  long  play ; 
so  we  returned,  but  only  in  time  for  the 
outburst  of  liberated  children,  whooping 
and  singing  and  noisily  joyful  at  the  end- 
ing of  the  week's  lessons.  The  little 
girls  dropped  their  pretty  curtsies  shyly, 
but  the  boys  kept  to  the  charming  Kafir 
salutation  of  throwing  up  the  right  hand 
with  its  two  fingers  extended,  and  crying 
"  Inkosi !"  It  is  a  good  deal  prettier  and 
more  graceful  than  the  complicated  wave 
and  bow  in  one  which  our  village  chil- 
dren accomplish  so  awkwardly. 

Oh,  how  I  should  like  to  "do  up"  that 
school-room,  and  hang  gay  prints  and 
picture  -  lessons  on  its  walls,  for  those 
bright  little  creatures  to  go  wild  with  de- 
light at !  There  has  been  so  much  need- 
ed in  the  settlement  that  no  money  has 
been  or  can  be  forthcoming  just  yet  for 
anything  beyond  bare  necessaries.  But 
the  school-room  wanted  "  doing  up  "  very 
much.  It  was  perfectly  sweet  and  clean, 
and  there  was  no  occasion  for  any  inspec- 
tor to  measure  out  so  many  cubic  feet  of 
air  to  each  child,  for  the  breeze  from  the 
mountains  was  whistling  in  at  every  crev- 
ice and  among  the  rafters,  and  the  floor 
was  well  scrubbed  daily ;  but  it  wanted 
new  stands  and  desks  and  forms — every- 
thing, in  short — most  sadly.  Then  just 
think  what  a  boon  it  would  be  if  the  most 
intelligent  and  promising  among  the  girls 
could  be  drafted  from  this  school  when 
twelve  years  old  into  a  training-school, 
where  they  could  be  taught  sewing  and 
cooking  and  other  homely  accomplish- 
ments !  There  is  no  place  in  the  colony 
where  one  can  turn  for  a  good  female 
servant,  and  yet  here  were  all  these  nice 
sharp  little  girls  only  wanting  the  oppor- 
tunity of  learning  to  grow  up  into  capital 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


servants  and  good  future  wives,  above 
merely  picking  mealies  or  hoeing  the 
ground. 

As  I  have  said  before,  I  am  no  polit- 
ical economist,  and  the  very  combina- 
tion of  words  frightens  me,  but  still  I 
can't  help  observing  how  we  are  wasting 
the  good  material  which  lies  ready  to  our 
hands.  When  one  first  arrives  one  is  told, 
as  a  frightful  piece  of  news,  that  there  are 
three  hundred  thousand  Kafirs  in  Natal, 
and  only  seventeen  thousand  whites.  The 
next  remark  is  that  immigration  is  the  cure 
for  all  the  evils  of  the  country,  and  that  we 
want  more  white  people.  Now,  it  seems 
to  me  that  is  just  what  we  don't  want — 
at  least,  white  people  of  what  is  called 
the  lower  classes.  Of  course,  every  col- 
ony is  the  better  for  the  introduction  of 
skilled  labor  and  intelligence  of  every 
kind,  no  matter  how  impecunious  it  may 
be.  But  the  first  thing  a  white  person  of 
any  class  at  all  does  here  is  to  set  up  Ka- 
firs under  him,  whom  he  knocks  about  as 
much  as  he  dares,  complaining  all  the  time 
of  their  ignorance  and  stupidity.  Every 
man  turns  at  once  into  a  master  and  an 
independent  gentleman,  with  black  ser- 
vants under  him  ;  and  the  result  is,  that 
it  is  impossible  to  get  the  simplest  thing 
properly  done,  for  the  white  people  -are 
too  fine  to  do  it,  and  the  black  ones  eith- 
er too  ignorant  or  too  lazy.  Then  there 
is  an  outcry  at  the  chronic  state  of  mud- 
dle and  discomfort  we  all  live  in.  Eng- 
lish servants  directly  expect  two  or  three 
Kafirs  under  them  to  do  their  work  ;  and 
really  no  one  except  ladies  and  gentle- 
men seem  to  do  anything  save  by  deputy. 
Now,  if  we  were  only  to  import  a  small 
number  of  teachers  and  trained  arti- 
sans of  the  highest  procurable  degree 
of  efficiency,  we  could  establish  training- 
schools  in  connection  with  the  missions 
which  are  scattered  all  over  the  country, 
and  which  have  been  doing  an  immense 
amount  of  good  silently  all  these  years. 
In  this  way  we  might  gradually  use  up 
the  material  we  have  all  ready  to  our 
hand  in  these  swarming  black  people ; 
and  it  appears  to  me  as  if  it  would  be 
more  likely  to  succeed  than  bringing 
shiploads  of  ignorant,  idle  whites  into 
the  colony.  There  is  no  doubt  about 


it :  Natal  will  never  be  an  attractive 
country  to  European  immigrants  ;  and  if 
it  is  not  to  be  fairly  crowded  out  of  the 
list  of  progressive  English  colonies  by 
its  population  of  blacks,  we  must  devise 
some  scheme  for  bringing  them  into  the 
great  brotherhood  of  civilization.  They 
are  undoubtedly  an  intelligent  people, 
good  -  humored  and  easy  to  manage. 
Their  laziness  is  their  great  drawback, 
but  at  such  a  settlement  as  Edendale  I 
heard  no  complaints,  and  certainly  there 
were  no  signs  of  it.  No  one  learns  more 
readily  than  a  savage  how  good  are  clothes 
and  shelter  and  the  thousand  comforts  of 
civilized  people.  Unhappily,  he  learns  the 
evil  with  the  good,  especially  in  the  towns, 
but  that  is  our  own  fault.  In  a  climate  with 
so  many  cold  days  as  this  the  want  of  cloth- 
ing is  severely  felt  by  the  Kafirs,  and  it 
is  one  of  the  first  inducements  to  work. 
Then  they  very  soon  learn  to  appreciate 
the  comfort  of  a  better  dwelling  than 
their  dark  huts,  and  a  wish  for  more 
nourishing  food  follows  next.  It  is  ea- 
sier to  get  at  the  children  and  form  their 
habits  and  ideas  than  to  change  those 
of  the  grown  -  up  men,  for  the  women 
scarcely  count  for  anything  at  present 
in  a  scheme  of  improvement :  they  are 
mere  hewers  of  wood  and  drawers  of 
water.  So  the  end  of  it  all  is,  that  I 
want  a  little  money  from  some  of  you 
rich  people  to  encourage  the  Edendale 
settlers  by  helping  them  with  their  ex- 
isting schools,  and  if  possible  setting 
up  training-schools  where  boys  could  be 
taught  carpentering  and  other  trades,  and 
the  girls  housewifery ;  and  I  want  the  same 
idea  taken  up  and  enlarged,  and  gradu- 
ally carried  out  on  a  grand  scale  all  over 
the  country. 

There  are  several  Norwegian  missions 
established  on  the  borders  of  Zululand, 
presided  over  by  Bishop  Schreuder ;  and 
I  have  been  so  immensely  interested  in 
the  bishop's  report  of  a  visit  he  paid  last 
year  to  Cetywayo  (there  is  a  click  in  the 
C),  the  Zulu  king,  that  I  have  copied 
some  of  it  out  of  a  Blue  Book  for  you. 
Do  you  know  there  is  a  very  wrong  im- 
pression abroad  about  blue  books  ?  They 
contain  the  most  interesting  reading  pos- 
sible, full  of  details  of  colonial  difficulties 


86 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


and  dangers  which  are  not  to  be  met  with 
anywhere  else,  and  I  have  never  been  bet- 
ter entertained  than  by  turning  over  the 
leaves  of  one  whenever  it  is  my  good 
fortune  to  come  across  it.  I  remember 
one  in  particular  upon  Japan,  beautiful- 
ly written,  and  as  thrillingly  sensational 
as  any  of  Miss  Braddon's  novels.  How- 
ever, you  shall  judge  for  yourself  of  the 
bishop's  narrative.  I  will  only  mention 
what  he  is  too  modest  to  cause  to  appear 
here — and  which  was  told  me  by  other 
people — that  he  is  one  of  the  most  zeal- 
ous and  fearless  of  the  great  band  of 
missionaries,  beloved  and  respected  by 
black  and  white.  In  fact,  my  inform- 
ant managed  to  convey  a  very  good 
impression  of  the  bishop's  character  to 
me  when  he  summed  up  his  panegyric 
in  true  colonial  phraseology,  though  I 
quite  admit  that  it  does  not  sound  suf- 
ficiently respectful  when  applied  to  a 
bishop:  "He  is  a  first-rate  fellow,  all 
round." 

This  document,  which  I  have  shorten- 
ed a  little,  was  addressed  as  a  letter  to 
our  minister  for  native  affairs,  and  has 
thus  become  public  property,  read  and 
re-read  with  deep  interest  by  us  here, 
and  likely,  I  am  sure,  to  please  a  wider 
circle : 

UNTUNJAMBILI,  August  20,  1875. 

DEAR  SIR  :  I  beg  to  send  you  a  short 
sketch  of  my  last  trip  to  and  interview 
with  the  Zulu  king,  in  order  to  present  to 
him  your  report  of  your  embassy,  1873, 
and  leave  it  to  your  discretion  to  lay  be- 
fore His  Excellency  the  whole  or  a  part 
of  this  sketch,  got  up  in  a  language  for- 
eign to  me. 

After  an  irksome  traveling  right  across 
the  Tugela  from  here  to  Undi,  I  arrived 
the  fifth  day  (August  5)  at  the  king's  head 
kraal  sufficiently  early  to  have  a  prelim- 
inary interview  with  the  headmen  then 
present — viz.,  Umnjamana,  Usegetwayo, 
Uganze,  Uzetzalusa,  Untzingwayo,  etc. — 
and,  according  to  Zulu  etiquette,  lay  be- 
fore them  the  substance  of  my  message 
in  the  main  points,  the  same  as  I,  the 
day  after  (6th  August),  told  the  king. 

(N.  B.  In  the  course  of  the  evening  one 
of  the  headmen  hinted  to  me  that  as  re- 


gards the  killing  of  people,  all  was  not  as 
it  ought  to  be,  and  that  I  ought  to  press 
the  matter  when  I  had  the  interview  with 
the  king,  as  he  needed  to  have  his  mem- 
ory (I  would  rather  say  his  conscience,  for 
his  memory  is  still  very  good — even  re- 
markably good)  stirred  up,  and  that  the 
present  occasion  was  the  very  time  to  do 
that.  The  result  proved  this  to  be  a  very 
safe  and  timely  hint.) 

They  spent  the  forenoon  communicat- 
ing in  their  bulky  way  this  news  to  the 
king,  so  it  was  midday  before  I  got  an 
interview  with  the  king,  when  I  opened 
the  interview  verbatim,  thus  : 

"  My  arrival  here  to-day  is  not  on  my 
own  account.  I  have  come  at  the  re- 
quest of  the  chiefs  across  (the  Tugela) 
to  cause  you  to  receive  by  hand  and  by 
mouth  a  book  which  has  come  from  Vic- 
toria, the  queen  of  the  English — the  book 
of  the  new  laws  of  this  Zulu  country, 
which  Somtseu  ( Mr.  Shepstone )  pro 
claimed  publicly  at  Umlambongwenya 
the  day  he,  being  called  to  do  so,  set 
you  apart  to  be  king  of  the  Zulus.  Vic- 
toria, queen  of  the  English,  says  :  '  I  and 
my  great  headmen  (ministers)  have  read 
the  new  laws  of  the  Zulu  country,  which 
you,  king,  and  all  the  Zulus,  agreed  to 
with  Somtseu ;  and  as  we  adhere  to  our 
words,  so  also  I  wish  you,  chief  of  the 
Zulus,  to  hold  fast  to  these  words  of  yours 
of  this  law  which  you  agreed  to  adhere 
to  the  day  you  were  made  king  by  Mr. 
Shepstone,  who  was  sent  to  do  that  by 
the  government  of  Natal.'  I  have  now 
finished:  this  is  the  only  word  I  have 
brought  with  me  from  the  chiefs  across 
(the  Tugela)." 

The  royal  inscription  of  the  copy  was 
of  course  literally  translated. 

After  having  thus  delivered  the  gov- 
ernment message  entrusted  to  me,  I  add- 
ed, in  the  way  of  explaining  to  the  king 
and  his  councilors  the  merits  of  the  case 
at  issue,  by  saying : 

"You  have  heard  the  government 
word,  but  that  you  may  clearly  see  the 
line  of  this  book  of  the  new  laws,  I  wish 
to  explain  to  you  as  follows:  The  day 
the  Zulu  nation  brought  the  head  of  the 
king,  laid  low,  four  oxen,  to  the  govern- 
ment, the  Zulu  nation  asked  that  Mr. 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


Shepstone  might  come  and  proclaim  the 
new  laws  of  Zululand,  and  set  apart  the 
real  royal  child,  because  they  no  longer 
had  power  of  themselves  to  set  apart  for 
themselves  a  king.  Mr.  Shepstone  came, 
and  began  by  consulting  you,  the  Zulu 
nation,  at  Umlambongwenya  on  the  fifth 
day  of  the  week,  on  all  the  points  of  the 
new  law  which  he  had  been  sent  for  to 
proclaim ;  and  he  conversed  with  you 
until  the  sun  went  down,  having  begun 
early  in  the  day.  He  then  left  you  Zu- 
lus to  consult  together  and  investigate 
the  new  laws  on  the  last  day  of  the  week 
and  on  the  Sunday  ;  and  when  Mr. 
Shepstone  returned  to  the  wagons  (camp) 
he  wrote  in  a  book  all  the  points  of  the 
new  law  ;  and  on  Monday  he  again  came 
with  all  his  attendants,  and  it  was  in  ac- 
cordance with  his  previous  arrangement 
with  you ;  and  he  came  to  the  Umlam- 
bongwenya, the  residence  appointed  for 
the  purpose,  that  he  might  set  apart  in 
becoming  manner  the  young  king.  We 
all  were  present :  we  heard  him,  stand- 
ing publicly,  holding  in  his  hand  a  paper, 
and  pointing  to  it,  saying,  '  That  forget- 
fulness  may  never,  never  happen,  I  have 
written  in  this  paper  all  the  points  of  the 
new  laws  of  the  country  which  we  agreed 
upon,  two  days  ago  and  to-day,  in  the 
presence  of  all  the  Zulu  nation,  the  royal 
children  and  the  nobles ;'  and  he  then 
handed  that  paper  to  his  son,  that  it 
might  be  accessible  and  speak  when  he 
himself  is  no  more ;  and  this  proclama- 
tion of  the  new  laws  was  confirmed  by 
the  English  custom  of  firing  cannons  sev- 
enteen times,  and  according  to  the  Zulu 
by  the  striking  of  shields.  On  the  sec- 
ond day  of  the  week  Mr.  Shepstone  re- 
turned to  the  Umlambongwenya  to  take 
his  leave  of  the  king,  and  again  the  points 
of  the  new  law  were  explained  ;  and  Ut- 
tainn  (Cetywayo's  brother)  explained  to 
Mr.  Shepstone  the  history  of  this  house  ; 
and  on  the  third  day  the  nobles  all  went 
to  the  wagons  (camp),  being  sent  to  the 
king  to  take  leave,  and  Mr.  Shepstone 
went  home  satisfied ;  and  when  he  re- 
turned to  the  colony  he  wrote  this  book 
of  the  narrative  of  his  journey  and  his 
work  in  Zululand ;  and,  as  is  done  (in  the 
colony),  then  he  sent  it  to  the  governor, 


and  the  governor  read  it,  and  read  it  all, 
and  said  the  work  of  Somtseu  is  good, 
and  the  new  laws  of  the  Zulu  country 
are  good ;  and,  as  is  done  there  too,  he 
sent  it  forward  to  Victoria,  the  queen  of 
the  English  ;  and  Victoria  sent  back  this 
book  of  the  new  laws  by  the  same  way 
to  the  governor,  and  the  governor  re- 
turned it  to  Somtseu,  and  here  it  is  come 
back  to  its  work  (discharge  its  function) 
in  Zululand,  where  it  was  set  up  to  rule 
over  you.  And  as  Victoria  binds  her- 
self by  her  words,  so  are  you  also,  king, 
and  you,  the  Zulu  nation,  bound  by  this 
new  law  made  for  you  here  by  Somtseu 
at  Umlambongwenya.  And  this  is  the 
generation  of  this  book  of  the  new  law : 
It  was  born  an  infant ;  it  went  across  (the 
water),  the  child  of  a  king,  to  seek  for 
kingship,  and  it  found  it ;  it  was  made 
king  far  away,  and  here  it  is  returned 
with  its  rank  to  its  own  country,  Zulu- 
land  ;  therefore  do  not  say  it  is  only  the 
book  that  speaks.  No,  I  tell  you,  Zulus, 
of  a  truth,  that  this  book  has  to-day  rank : 
it  took  that  rank  beyond  (the  water) :  it 
has  come  back  a  king,  and  is  supreme 
in  this  country. 

"The  words  of  the  governor  are  fin- 
ished, and  my  explanation  is  finished ; 
but  there  are  small  items  of  news  which 
I  wish  to  tell  you  in  your  ears,  which  the 
authorities  (in  Natal)  did  not  tell  me, 
but  which  I  speak  for  myself  because 
I  wish  to  see  for  you  and  reprove  you 
gently,  that  you  may  understand." 

Uganze  then  commenced  in  his  usual 
tattling  way  to  make  some  remarks,  that 
they,  as  black  people,  did  not  understand 
books  and  the  value  of  such  written  doc- 
uments ;  whereupon  I  said  to  him,  "That 
won't  do,  Ganze,  that  you,  after  having 
applied,  as  in  the  present  case,  to  people 
who  transact  business  through  written 
documents,  now  afterward  say  you  do 
not  understand  the  value  of  books.  You 
all  know  very  well  that  book-rules  are 
supreme  with  white  people :  it  is  there- 
fore of  no  use  that  you,  after  having  ob- 
tained what  you  wanted  from  the  white 
people,  now  come  and  plead  ignorance 
about  book.  If  you  don't  know  your- 
selves to  read  book,  there  is  nothing  else 
for  you  to  be  done  but  to  get  a  trustwor- 


88 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


thy  person  to  read  for  you,  or  learn  to 
read  yourselves." 

By  these  remarks  I  stopped  effectually 
all  further  talk  of  that  kind ;  and,  evi- 
dently displeased  at  Uganze's  talk,  the 
king  repeated  very  correctly  all  I  had 
endeavored  to  say.  (You  know  the  king 
has  a  good  memory.) 

While  I  was  translating,  the  king  and 
his  nobles  often  expressed  their  astonish- 
ment, uttering  occasionally  that  it  was  as 
if  they  were  living  the  thing  over  again, 
and  that  what  was  translated  was  exact- 
ly what  was  spoken  and  transacted  in 
your  way  to  and  under  your  stay  at  the 
place  of  encampment ;  and,  having  fin- 
ished, I  told  them  that  the  fullness  and 
correctness  of  the  details  of  the  report 
was  a  natural  result  of  the  habit  of  white 
people  under  such  circumstances,  daily 
to  take  down  in  writing  what  transpired, 
in  order  not  to  forget  it  itself  long  time 
afterward. 

As  the  king  and  his  nobles  now  enter- 
ed upon  a  discussion  of  the  merits  of  the 
new  laws  as  set  forth  in  your  report,  and 
this  discussion  evidently  would  take  the 
turn  of  being  an  answer  to  the  message 
delivered,  I  found  it  necessary  to  tell 
them  that  I  had  received  no  commission 
to  bring  back  any  answer  to  the  govern- 
ment message ;  and  stated  my  own  private 
opinion  about  not  having  received  such 
commission  by  saying  most  explicitly, 
"  My  opinion  is  that  the  chiefs  across  the 
Tugela  did  not  tell  me  to  take  back  to 
them  your  answer,  because  your  right 
words  to  adhere  to  the  new  law  are  com- 
pleted. They  are  many  :  no  more  are 
necessary.  The  thing  wanted  now  is 
your  acts  in  accordance  with  the  law." 

Here,  again,  Uganze  asked  what  I  meant 
by  acts  ;  and  the  answer  was,  "  That  you 
rule  and  manage  this  Zululand  in  accord- 
ance with  the  new  law,  and  never  over- 
step it;"  and  I  explained  this  further  by 
telling  them  frankly  that  many  reports 
circulated  in  Natal  of  the  extensive  kill- 
ing of  people  all  over  the  Zululand  ;  that 
from  the  time  I  this  year  had  crossed  the 
Tugela,  Natal  people  had  with  one  mouth 
asked  me  if  the  killing  of  people  in  Zu- 
luland now  really  was  carried  on  to  such 
an  extent  as  reported,  in  spite  of  the  new 


law ;  that  I  had  not  with  my  own  eyes 
seen  any  corpse,  and  personally  only 
knew  of  them  said  to  have  been  killed ; 
that  I  myself  had  my  information  prin- 
cipally from  the  same  sources  as  people 
in  Natal,  and  often  from  Natal  newspa- 
pers ;  that  I  myself  personally  believed 
that  there  were  some,  and  perhaps  too 
much,  foundation  for  said  reports  :  there 
were  many  who  pretended  having  seen 
corpses  of  people  killed  both  with  guns 
and  spears.  And,  after  having  lectured 
my  Zulu  audience  very  earnestly  upon 
this  vital  point,  I  concluded,  saying, 
"  Well-wishers  of  the  Zulus  are  very  sorry 
to  hear  of  such  things,  as  they  certainly 
had  hoped  that  the  new  constitution 
would  have  remedied  this  sad  shedding 
of  blood ;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  peo- 
ple who  did  not  care  whether  the  Zulu 
nation  was  ruined  or  not,  merely  laugh- 
ed at  the  idea  that  any  one  ever  could 
have  entertained  the  hope  of  altering  or 
amending  the  old-cherished  Zulu  prac- 
tice of  bloodshed,  as  the  Zulus  were  such 
an  irrecoverable  set  of  man -butchers. 
Further,  I  tell  you  seriously,  king,  your 
reputation  is  bad  among  the  whites  ;  and, 
although  it  is  not  as  yet  officially  report- 
ed to  the  government,  still  it  has  come 
to  its  ears,  all  these  bloody  rumors,  and 
nobody  can  tell  what  may  be  the  con- 
sequences hereafter — to-morrow." 

The  king  and  his  izinduna  seemed 
wonderfully  tame — even  conscience-smit- 
ten all  along  —  while  the  rumors  were 
mentioned,  for  I  had  expected  some  of 
their  usual  unruly  excitement ;  but  noth- 
ing of  that  kind  was  seen.  But,  although 
the  king  and  his  nobles  present  had,  as 
mentioned  above,  with  astonishment  ut- 
tered that  your  report  had  reported  ex- 
actly everything  done  and  said  there  and 
then,  he  now  tried  to  point  out  that  you, 
in  your  report,  had  left  out  to  inform  the 
queen  that  he,  in  his  transactions  with 
you,  had  reserved  to  himself  the  right 
of  killing  people  who  kill  others,  who  lie 
with  the  king's  girls,  who  sin  against  or 
steal  the  king's  property — that  it  is  the 
royal  Zulu  prerogative  "  from  time  imme- 
morial," at  the  accession  to  the  throne, 
to  make  raid  on  neighboring  tribes.  I 
went  into  details  of  both  questions,  and 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


89 


proved  by  plain  words  of  your  report,  as 
well  as  by  logical  conclusion  therefrom, 
the  fallacy  of  both  complaints  ;  and  espe- 
cially as  to  the  pretended  "  from  time  im- 
memorial," that  this  was  nonsense,  as 
that  bloody  system  of  raid  only  was  from 
yesterday  (chaka],  and  therefore  there 
were  no  reasons  why  it  should  not  be 
broken  off  to-morrow ;  and  much  more 
so  as  this  raid  -  system  only  tended  to 
exasperate  all  neighboring  tribes  against 
the  Zulus,  and  eventually  bring  on  their 
(Zulus')  ruin,  for  it  was  well  known  that 
all  neighboring  tribes  were  gradually 
coming  under  the  protection  of  the  white 
people.  The  king  made,  in  self-defence, 
some  irrelevant  remarks,  and  was  of 
course  supported  by  the  izinduna  in  the 
usual  Zulu-duda  way,  but,  most  remark- 
ably, in  a  very  tame  way  ;  but  I  thought 
by  myself,  "  It  is  easy  to  make  an  end  to 
this  support  and  combination,  for  I  shall 
split  your  interest,  and  then  combat  you 
singly."  So  I  turned  the  current  of  the 
discussion  in  this  way,  saying,  "I  do 
really  believe  that  there  is  going  on  kill- 
ing people  in  such  a  manner  that  the 
king  is  blamed  in  Natal  for  doings  he 
first  afterward  is  made  aware  of — viz., 
the  grandees  will,  for  example,  kill  a 
man  of  no  note,  take  a  few  heads  of 
cattle  to  the  king  in  order  to  shut  his 
mouth,  saying,  '  I  found  a  rat  spoiling 
my  things,  and  struck  this  rat  of  mine, 
and  here  is  the  few  cattle  it  left  behind.' 
Then  the  king  will — although  the  thing 
does  not  suit  him — think  by  himself,  '  If 
I  stir  up  in  this  poltroon  matter,  my 
grandees  will  say  that  I  trouble  them ;' 
and  so  the  thing  is  growing  on,  and 
brings  on  such  rumors  and  bad  names 
over  in  Natal.  But  was  it  not  agreed 
upon,  king,  at  your  installation,  that  the 
common  saying, '  My  man,'  or  '  My  peo- 
ple,' must  not  be  tolerated  any  longer  ? 
It  must  cease  in  the  mouth  of  the 
grandees  in  the  country.  Here  in  the 
Zululand  is  now  'my  people'  of  the 
grandees,  but  all  are  people  of  the 
king.  The"  grandees  have  no  right  to 
the  people :  the  king  is  the  owner  of 
them  all  solely.  And  was  it  not  agreed 
upon  that  no  Zulu — male  or  female,  old 
or  young — could  be  executed  without  fair, 


open  trial  and  the  special  previous  sanc- 
tion of  the  king  ?  But  now,  by  the  old 
practice  creeping  into  use  again,  and  the 
grandees  killing  their  so-called  people, 
and  the  king  killing  his,  it  is  like  the  real 
owner  and  the  other  imaginary  owners 
killing  independently  cattle  out  of  the 
same  herd,  without  telling  each  other,  till 
the  herd  is  cut  up.  By  executing  people 
who  really  only  belong  to  the  king,  the 
grandees  will,  in  the  same  degree  as  they 
do  so,  detract  from  and  diminish  the  roy- 
al power  and  prerogative,  so  that  there 
in  fact  reign  several  kings  in  this  same 
kingdom,  at  least  as  far  as  the  authority 
over  life  and  death  concerns.  The  gran- 
dees are  concealed  behind  their  king  in 
the  bad  rumors  over  in  Natal ;  so  the 
king  gains  a  bad  name  and  blame  for 
the  whole,  while  the  grandees  gain  the 
satisfaction  of  succeeding  in  killing  peo- 
ple they  dislike." 

The  king  assented  to  these  my  re- 
marks ;  so  the  izinduna  found  them- 
selves deserted  and  silenced.  Umnja- 
mana  only  tried  to  put  in  a  few  very 
tame  remarks  of  his  usual  ones,  but  I 
quickly  brought  him  to  his  senses  by  re- 
membering him  sharply  of  his  sayings 
and  doings  at  the  installation.  I  now 
thought  it  high  time  to  cut  the  further 
parlance  short  by  saying,  "  I  find  that  I 
am  going  to  be  dragged  into  an  argu- 
ment about  matters  that  are  no  business 
of  mine,  and  I  will  therefore  talk  no 
more  of  these  things,  for  the  new  law- 
owners  are  still  alive;  and,  moreover, 
the  new  law  is  there  invested  with  un- 
deniable royalty;  so  that  even  when 
Her  Majesty  Victoria,  her  present  coun- 
cilors and  the  rest  of  us  are  no  more, 
the  Umteto  will  be  there,  and  numerous 
copies  of  it  are  in  the  hands  of  the  white 
people,  so  that  they  at  present  and  in  fu- 
ture times  will  be  able  to  compare  wheth- 
er the  doings  of  yours  (Zulu)  are  in  ac- 
cordance or  at  variance  with  that  law, 
and  take  their  measures  accordingly. 
Victoria  binds  herself  by  books,  and  so 
you  are  bound  by  this  book  of  new  law 
that  now  is  ruling  supreme :  that  is  the 
long  and  short  of  it,  for  this  book  of  the 
law  will  decay  with  the  country.  ...  I 
have  now  talked  myself  tired,  finished 


9° 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


my  verbal  errand  to  you,  king,  and  now 
I  will  hand  over  to  you  this  splendid  copy 
of  the  new  law."  He  then  said,  "  Lay  it 
down  here"  (pointing  to  the  mat  under 
his  feet).  "No,"  I  replied,  "that  won't 
do :  the  book  is  not  at  your  feet,  but  you 
are  at  the  feet  of  the  book ;  and  if  my 
hands  are  not  too  good  to  hand  it  over 
to  you,  your  hands  ought  not  to  be  too 
good  to  receive  it.  Don't  make  any  dif- 
ficulty." So  he  received  the  copy  with 
his  hands,  laid  it  himself  on  the  mat, 
placed  both  his  elbows  on  his  knees,  and 
holding  bent  over  his  head  between  his 
hands,  uttered  that  peculiar  native  "Oh 
dear  !  oh  dear  !  what  a  man  this  is !" 

The  king  evidently  felt  himself  so  out 
of  his  depth  that  he  quite  forgot  his  usual 
final  topics,  begging  for  a  royal  cloak 
(the  standing  topic  of  late)  or  some  sim- 
ilar thing,  and  dropped  into  begging  for 
a  dog  to  bark  for  him  at  night. 

Lastly,  in  order  to  test  him  how  he 
now  was  disposed  toward  mission-work, 
I  told  him  that,  as  my  business  with  him 
was  finished,  I  should  immediately,  with- 
out sleeping  that  night  at  Undi,  com- 
mence my  homeward  journey,  for  I 
had  left  much  work  to  be  done  behind, 
having  commenced  a  new  station  over 
in  Natal,  as  here  in  Zululand  is  no  work 
for  us  missionaries  as  long  as  he  prohib- 
ited his  subjects  from  becoming  Chris- 
tians ;  therefore  it  was  at  present  quite 
sufficient  for  me  in  Zululand,  where  it, 
under  present  circumstances,  was  use- 
less to  get  new  stations  only  to  live  and 
not  work  on,  while  we  over  in  Natal 
could  buy,  and  from  government,  who 
approved  of  the  mission-work,  get  land 
for  stations ;  moreover,  the  people — for 
example,  over  at  Untunjambili  —  were 
very  anxious  to  be  taught.  With  an 
heedful  air  the  king  asked,  "Do  the 
Kafirs  really  wish  to  be  taught?"  "Yes, 
they  really  do,"  I  answered  him. 

Thinking  that  it  would  do  them  (the 
king  and  councilors)  good  to  hear  a  bit 
of  those  proceedings,  I  inserted  a  few 
words  about  the  contemplated  and  pro- 
posed federation  between  the  colony  of 
Natal,  Cape,  the  Transvaal,  and  Orange 


States  by  mentioning  that  an  important 
letter  from  the  great  people  beyond  the 
water  had  come  and  proposed  a  grand 
meeting  of  men  chosen  from  these  four 
states  to  deliberate  of  the  best  mode 
of  establishing  such  federation  among 
themselves,  and  the  advantage  and  im- 
portance of  this  federation,  which  I  tried 
to  point  out  by  a  few  practical  instances. 
The  king  and  his  induna  now  insisted 
upon  my  not  leaving  before  next  morn- 
ing, as  the  king  wanted  to  prepare  for 
me  (get  me  some  living  beef);  and  in 
the  course  of  the  evening  I  got  a  special 
message  from  him  to  you  to  get  from  a 
doctor  medicine  for  a  complaint  he  had 
in  the  chest,  rising  at  times  from  regions 
about  the  liver,  and  medicine  for  an  in- 
duna who  of  late  had  been  completely 
deaf.  The  messenger  also  told  that  the 
king  already  had  sent  to  you  for  medi- 
cines, but  as  yet  got  no  answer.  I  think 
that  he  has  found  out  that  it  comes  very 
expensive  to  call  a  dotela  from  Natal, 
and  that  it  therefore  would  be  cheapest 
to  get  the  aid  of  genuine  doctors  through 
your  kind  unpaid  assistance. 

Under  the  conversation  with  the  king 
the  headman  Usagetwayo  (a  rather  stu- 
pid man,  but  whose  assumed  grandeur 
is  so  great  and  supercilious  that  he  pre- 
tends never  to  know  anybody,  but  al- 
ways must  ask  somebody  who  this  is) 
asked  in  his  well-known  hoarse  way, 
"  Who  is  he  there  who  speaks  with  the 
king?"  (meaning  me).  Umnjamana  an- 
swered, "  Bishop  Schreuder,  native  man  : 
he  is  Panda's  old  headman.  You  are 
joking  in  saying  you  don't  know  him  :  it 
was  he  for  whom  they  cut  off  the  large 
bit  of  land  at  Enlumeni."  (One  of  my 
Christian  natives  present  overheard  this 
conversation  getting  on  in  a  subdued 
tone  while  I  was  speaking  with  the  king.) 

When  our  interview  commenced  the 
king  seemed  rather  sulky,  but  got  grad- 
ually brighter,  at  least  very  tame,  which 
hardly  could  have  been  expected  after 
such  dusky  beginning,  for  which  there 
were  also  other  reasons,  needless  to  spe- 
cify here.  I  remain,  etc., 

H.  SCHREUDER. 


MARITZBURG,  June  3,  1876. 

DUST  and  the  bazaar!  These  are 
the  topics  of  the  month.  Perhaps 
I  ought  to  put  the  bazaar  first,  for  it  is 
past  and  over,  to  the  intense  thankful- 
ness of  everybody,  buyers  and  sellers 
included,  whereas  the  dust  abides  with 
us  for  ever,  and  increases  in  volume  and 
density  and  restlessness  more  and  more. 
It  certainly  seems  to  me  a  severe  penalty 
to  pay  for  these  three  months  of  fine  and 
agreeable  weather  to  have  no  milk,  hard- 
ly any  butter,  very  little  water,  and  to  be 
smothered  by  dust  into  the  bargain.  But 
still,  here  is  a  little  bit  of  bracing,  healthy 
weather,  and  far  be  it  from  me  to  depre- 
ciate it.  We  enjoy  every  moment  of  it, 
and  congratulate  each  other  upon  it,  and 
boast  once  more  to  new-comers  that  we 
possess  "the  finest  climate  in  the  world." 
This  remark  died  out  in  the  summer,  but 
is  again  to  be  heard  on  all  sides ;  and  I 
am  not  strong-minded  enough  to  take  up 
lance  and  casque  and  tilt  against  it.  Be- 
sides which,  it  would  really  be  very  pleas- 
ant if  only  the  tanks  were  not  dry,  the 
cows  giving  but  a  teacupful  of  milk  a  day 
for  want  of  grass,  whilst  butter  is  half  a 
crown  a  pound,  and  of  a  rancid  cheesiness 
trying  to  the  consumer.  Still,  the  weath- 
er is  bright  and  sunny  and  fresh  all  day — 
too  hot,  indeed,  in  the  sun,  and  general- 
ly bitterly  cold  in  the  evening  and  night. 
About  once  a  week,  however,  we  have  a 
burning  hot  wind,  and  are  obliged  still  to 
keep  our  summer  clothes  close  at  hand. 
The  rapidity  with  which  cold  succeeds 
this  hot  wind  is  hardly  to  be  believed. 
Our  "season"  is  just  over.  It  lasts  as 
nearly  as  possible  one  week,  and  all  the 
gayety  and  festivity  of  the  year  is  crowd- 
ed into  it.  During  this  time  of  revelry 
I  drove  down  the  hill  to  a  garden-party 
one  sunny  afternoon,  and  found  a  muslin 
scarf  absolutely  unbearable,  so  intensely 
hot  was  the  air.  That  was  about  three 
o'clock,  and  by  five  I  was  driving  home 
in  the  darkening  twilight,  dusty  as  a  mill- 


er and  shivering  in  a  seal-skin  jacket.  It 
is  no  wonder  that  most  of  us,  Kafirs  and 
all,  have  fearful  colds  and  coughs,  or  that 
croup  is  both  common  and  dangerous 
among  the  little  ones.  Still,  we  must 
never  lose  sight  of  the  fact  that  it  is  "the 
finest  climate  in  the  world,"  and  excep- 
tionally favorable,  or  so  they  say,  to  con- 
sumptive patients. 

I  am  more  thankful  than  words  can 
express  that  we  live  out  of  the  town, 
though  the  pretty  green  slopes  around 
are  sere  and  yellow  now,  with  here  and 
there  patches  of  black  where  the  fires 
rage  night  and  day  among  the  tall  grass. 
About  this  season  prudent  people  burn 
strips  around  their  fences  and  trees  to 
check  any  vagrant  fire,  for  there  is  so 
little  timber  that  the  few  green  trees  are 
precious  things,  not  to  be  shriveled  up 
in  an  hour  by  fast-traveling  flames  for 
want  of  precautions.  The  spruits  or 
brooks  run  low  in  their  beds,  the  ditches 
are  dry,  the  wells  have  only  a  bucketful 
of  muddy  water  and  a  good  many  frogs 
in  them,  and  the  tanks  are  failing  one 
after  another.  Yet  this  is  only  the  be- 
ginning of  winter,  and  I  am  told  that  I 
don't  yet  know  what  dust  and  drought 
mean.  I  begin  to  think  affectionately  of 
those  nice  heavy  thunder-showers  every 
evening,  and  to  long  to  see  again  the 
familiar  bank  of  cloud  peeping  up  over 
that  high  hill  to  the  west,  precursor  of  a 
deluge.  Well !  well !  there  is  no  satisfy- 
ing some  people.  I  am  ready  to  swal- 
low my  share  of  dust  as  uncomplaining- 
ly as  may  be,  but  I  confess  to  horrible 
anxiety  as  to  what  we  are  all  to  do  for 
milk  for  the  babies  presently.  Every 
two  or  three  days  I  get  a  polite  note  from 
whoever  is  supplying  me  with  milk  to 
say  they  are  extremely  sorry  to  state  they 
shall  be  obliged  to  discontinue  doing  so, 
as  their  cows  don't  give  a  pint  a  day 
amongst  them  all.  The  little  which  is 
to  be  had  is  naturally  enormously  dear. 
F steadily  declines  to  buy  a  cow,  be- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


cause  he  says  he  knows  it  will  be  just 
like  all  the  rest,  but  I  think  if  only  I  had 
a  cow  I  should  contrive  to  find  food  for 
it  somewhere.  I  see  those  horrid  tins  of 
preserved  milk  drawing  nearer  and  near- 
er day  by  day. 

It  is  very  wrong  to  pass  over  our  great 
bazaar  with  so  little  notice.  I  dare  say 
you  who  read  this  think  that  you  know 
something  about  bazaars,  but  I  assure  you 
you  do  not — not  about  such  a  bazaar 
as  this,  at  all  events.  We  have  been 
preparing  for  it,  working  for  it,  worrying 
for  it,  advertising  it,  building  it,  decorat- 
ing it,  and  generally  slaving  at  it  for  a 
year  and  more.  When  I  arrived  the  first 
words  I  heard  were  about  the  bazaar. 
WThen  I  tried  to  get  some  one  to  help  me 
with  my  stall,  I  was  laughed  at :  all  the 
young  ladies  in  the  place  had  been  se- 
cured months  before  as  saleswomen.  I 
don't  know  what  I  should  have  done  if  a 
very  charming  lady  had  not  arrived  soon 
after  I  did.  No  sooner  had  she  set  foot 
on  shore  than  I  rushed  at  her  and  snap- 
ped her  up  before  any  one  else  knew  that 
she  had  come,  for  I  was  quite  desperate, 
and  felt  it  was  my  only  chance.  How- 
ever, luck  was  on  my  side,  and  my  fair 
A.  D.  C.  made  up  in  energy  and  devotion 
to  the  cause  for  half  a  dozen  less  enthu- 
siastic assistants.  All  this  time  I  have 
never  told  you  what  the  bazaar  was  for, 
or  why  we  all  threw  ourselves  into  it  with 
so  much  ardor.  It  was  for  the  Natal  Lit- 
erary Society,  which  has  been  in  exist- 
ence some  little  time,  struggling  to  form 
the  nucleus  of  a  public  library  and  read- 
ing-room, giving  lectures  and  so  forth  to 
provide  some  sort  of  elevating  and  refin- 
ing influences  for  the  more  thoughtful 
among  the  Maritzburgians.  It  has  been 
very  up-hill  work,  and  there  is  no  doubt 
that  the  promoters  and  supporters  de- 
serve a  good  deal  of  credit.  They  had 
met  with  the  usual  fate  of  such  pioneers 
of  progress  :  they  had  been  overwhelmed 
with  prophecies  of  all  kinds  of  disaster, 
but  they  can  turn  the  tables  now  on  their 
tormentors.  The  building  did  not  take 
fire,  nor  was  it  robbed ;  there  were  no 
riots ;  all  the  boxes  arrived  in  time ; 
everybody  was  in  the  sweetest  temper ; 
no  one  died  for  want  of  fresh  air  (these 


were  among  the  most  encouraging  prog- 
nostics) ;  and  last,  not  least,  after  paying 
all  expenses  two  thousand  guineas  stand 
at  the  bank  to  the  credil  of  the  society. 
I  must  say  1  was  astonished  at  the  finan- 
cial result,  but  delighted  too,  for  it  is  an 
excellent  undertaking,  and  one  in  which 
I  feel  the  warmest  interest.  It  will  be  an 
immense  boon  to  the  public,  and  cannot 
fail  to  elevate  the  tone  of  thought  and 
feeling  in  the  town.  This  sum,  large  as 
it  is  for  our  slender  resources,  will  only 
barely  build  a  place  suitable  for  a  libra- 
ry and  reading-room,  and  the  nucleus 
of  a  museum.  We  want  gifts  of  books 
and  maps  and  prints,  and  nice  things 
of  all  kinds;  and  I  only  wish  any  one 
who  reads  these  lines,  and  could  help 
us  in  this  way,  would  kindly  do  so,  for 
it  will  be  a  long  time  before  we  can  buy 
such  things  for  ourselves,  and  yet  they 
are  indispensable  to  the  carrying  out  of 
the  scheme. 

Everybody  from  far  and  near  came  to 
the  bazaar  and  bought  liberally.  The 
things  provided  were  selected  with  a 
view  to  the  wants  of  a  community  which 
has  not  a  large  margin  for  luxuries,  and 
although  'they  were  very  pretty,  there 
was  a  strong  element  of  practical  useful- 
ness in  everything.  It  must  have  been 
a  perfect  carnival  for  the  little  ones. 
Such  blowing  of  whistles  and  trumpets, 
such  beating  of  drums  and  tossing  of 
gay  balls  in  the  air,  as  were  to  be  seen  all 
around  !  Little  girls  walked  about  hug- 
ging newly-acquired  dolls  with  an  air  of 
bewildered  maternal  happiness,  whilst 
on  every  side  you  heard  boys  comparing 
notes  as  to  the  prices  of  cricket-bats  (for 
your  true  colonial  boy  has  always  a  keen 
sense  of  the  value  of  money)  or  the  mer- 
its of  carpenters'  tools.  A  wheelwright 
gave  half  a  dozen  exquisitely -finished 
wheelbarrows  to  the  bazaar,  made  of  the 
woods  of  the  colony,  and  useful  as  well 
as  exceedingly  pretty.  The  price  was 
high,  but  I  shut  my  economical  eyes 
tight  and  bought  one,  to  the  joy  and  de- 
light of  the  boys,  big  and  little.  There 
were  heaps  of  similar  things,  besides  con- 
tributions from  London  and  Paris,  from 
Italy  and  Austria,  from  India  and  Aus- 
tralia, to  say  nothing  of  Kafir  weapons 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


93 


and  wooden  utensils,  of  live-stock,  veg- 
etables and  flowers.  Everybody  re- 
sponded to  our  entreaties,  and  helped 
us  liberally  and  kindly  ;  and  this  is  the 
result  with  which  we  are  all  immensely 
delighted. 

Some  of  our  best  customers  were  funny 
old  Dutchmen  from  far  up  country,  who 
had  come  down  to  the  races  and  the 
agricultural  show,  which  were  all  going 
on  at  the  same  time.  They  bought  reck- 
lessly the  most  astounding  things,  but 
wisely  made  it  a  condition  of  purchase 
that  they  should  not  be  required  to  take 
away  the  goods.  In  fact,  they  hit  upon 
the  expedient  of  presenting  to  one  stall 
what  they  bought  at  another ;  and  one 
worthy,  who  looked  for  all  the  world  as 
if  he  had  sat  for  his  portrait  in  dear  old 
Geoffrey  Crayon's  Sketch-books,  brought 
us  at  our  stall  a  large  wax  doll  dressed 
as  a  bride,  and  implored  us  to  accept  it, 
and  so  rid  him  of  its  companionship.  An 
immense  glass  vase  was  bestowed  on  us 
in  a  similar  fashion  later  on  in  the  even- 
ing, and  at  last  we  quite  came  to  hail  the 
sight  of  those  huge  beaver  hats  with  their 
broad  brims  and  peaked  crowns  as  an 
omen  of  good  fortune.  But  what  I  most 
wanted  to  see  all  the  time  were  the  he- 
roes of  the  rocket  practice.  You  do  not 
know  perhaps  that  delicious  and  verita- 
ble South  African  story ;  so  I  must  tell  it 
to  you,  only  you  ought  to  see  my  dear 
boers  or  emigrant  farmers  to  appreciate 
it  thoroughly. 

A  little  time  ago  the  dwellers  in  a  cer- 
tain small  settlement  far  away  on  the 
frontier  took  alarm  at  the  threatening  at- 
titude of  their  black  neighbors.  I  need 
not  go  into  the  rights  —  or  rather  the 
wrongs — of  the  story  here,  but  skip  all 
preliminary  details  and  start  fair  one  fine 
morning  when  a  commando  was  about 
to  march.  Now,  a  commando  means 
a  small  expedition  armed  to  the  teeth, 
which  sets  forth  to  do  as  much  retalia- 
tory mischief  as  it  can.  It  had  occurred 
to  the  chiefs  of  this  warlike  force  that  a 
rocket  apparatus  would  be  a  very  fine 
thing,  and  likely  to  strike  awe  into  sav- 
age tribes,  and  so  would  a  small,  light 
cannon.  The  necessary  funds  were  forth- 
coming, and  some  kind  friend  in  Eng- 


land sent  them  out  a  beautiful  little  rock- 
et-tube, all  complete,  and  the  most  know- 
ing and  destructive  of  light  field-pieces. 
They  reached  their  destination  in  the  very 
nick  of  time — the  eve,  in  fact,  of  the  de- 
parture of  this  valiant  commando.  It 
was  deemed  advisable  to  make  trial  of 
these  new  weapons  before  starting,  and 
an  order  was  issued  for  the  commando 
to  assemble  a  little  earlier  in  the  market- 
square  and  learn  to  handle  their  artillery 
pieces  before  marching.  Not  only  did 
the  militia  assemble,  but  all  the  towns- 
folk, men,  women  and  children,  and  clus- 
tered like  bees  round  the  rocket-tube, 
which  had  been  placed  near  the  powder 
magazine,  so  as  to  be  handy  to  the  am- 
munition. The  first  difficulty  consisted  in 
finding  anybody  who  had  ever  seen  a 
cannon  before  :  as  for  a  rocket-tube,  that 
was  indeed  a  new  invention.  The  most 
careful  search  only  succeeded  in  pro- 
ducing a  boer  who  had  many,  many 
years  ago  made  a  voyage  in  an  old  tea- 
ship  which  carried  a  couple  of  small 
guns  for  firing  signals,  etc.  This  valiant 
artilleryman  was  at  once  elected  com- 
mander-in-chief  of  the  rocket-tube  and 
the  little  cannon,  whilst  everybody  stood 
by  to  see  some  smart  practice.  The  tube 
was  duly  hung  on  its  tripod,  and  the  re- 
luctant fellow-passenger  of  the  two  old 
cannon  proceeded  to  load,  and  attempt- 
ed to  fire  it.  The  loading  was  compara- 
tively easy,  but  the  firing  !  I  only  wish  I 
understood  the  technical  terms  of  rock- 
et-firing, but,  although  they  have  been 
minutely  explained  to  me  half  a  dozen 
times,  I  don't  feel  strong  enough  on  the 
subject  to  venture  to  use  them.  The  re- 
sults were,  that  some  connecting  cord  or 
other  having  been  severed  contrary  to 
the  method  generally  pursued  by  experts 
in  letting  off  a  rocket,  half  of  the  pro- 
jectile took  fire,  could  not  escape  from 
the  tube  on  account  of  the  other  half 
blocking  up  the  passage,  and  there  was 
an  awful  internal  commotion  instead  of 
an  explosion.  The  tripod  gyrated  rap- 
idly, the  whizzing  and  fizzing  became 
more  pronounced  every  moment,  and  at 
last,  with  a  whish  and  a  bang,  out  rush- 
ed the  ill-treated  and  imprisoned  rocket. 
But  there  was  no  clear  space  for  it.  It 


94 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


ricochetted  among  the  trees,  zigzagging 
here  and  there,  opening  out  a  line  for 
itself  with  lightning  speed  among  the  ter- 
rified and  flustered  crowd.  There  seem- 
ed no  end  to  the  progress  of  that  blazing 
stick.  A  wild  cry  arose,  "The  powder 
magazine  !"  but  before  the  stick  could 
reach  so  far,  it  brought  up  all  standing 
in  a  wagon,  and  made  one  final  leap 
among  the  oxen,  killing  two  of  them 
and  breaking  the  leg  of  a  third.  This 
was  an  unfortunate  beginning  for  the 
new  captain,  but  he  excused  himself  on 
the  ground  that,  after  all,  rockets  were 
not  guns :  with  those  he  was  perfectly 
familiar,  having  smoked  his  pipe  often 
and  often  on  board  the  tea-ship  long  ago 
with  those  two  cannon  full  in  view.  Yet 
the  peaceablest  cannons  have  a  nasty 
trick  of  running  back  and  treading  on 
the  toes  of  the  bystanders  ;  and  to  guard 
against  such  well-known  habits  it  seem- 
ed advisable  to  plant  the  trail  of  this  lit- 
tle fellow  securely  in  the  ground,  so  that 
he  must  perforce  keep  steady.  "Volun- 
teers to  the  front  writh  spades  !"  was  the 
cry,  and  a  good-sized  grave  was  made 
for  the  trail  of  the  gun,  which  was  then 
lightly  covered  up  with  earth.  There 
was  now  no  fear  in  loading  him,  and  in- 
stead of  one,  two  charges  of  powder  were 
carefully  rammed  home,  and  two  shells 
put  in.  There  was  some  hitch  also  about 
applying  the  fuse  to  this  weapon,  fuses 
not  having  been  known  on  board  the 
tea-ship;  but  at  last  something  was  ig- 
nited, and  out  jumped  one  shell  right  into 
the  middle  of  the  market-square,  and 
buried  itself  in  the  ground.  But,  alas 
and  alas !  the  cannon  now  behaved  in 
a  wholly  unexpected  manner.  It  turned 
itself  deliberately  over  on  its  back,  with 
its  muzzle  pointing  full  among  the  groups 
of  gaping  Dutchmen  in  its  rear,  its  wheels 
spun  round  at  the  rate  of  a  thousand 
miles  an  hour,  and  a  fearful  growling 
and  sputtering  could  be  heard  inside  it. 
The  recollection  of  the  second  shell  now 
obtruded  itself  vividly  on  all  minds,  and 
caused  a  furious  stampede  among  the 
spectators.  The  fat  Dutchmen  looked 
as  if  they  were  playing  some  child's 
game.  One  ran  behind  another,  puttung 
his  hands  on  his  shoulders,  but  no  soon- 


er did  any  person  find  himself  the  first 
of  a  file  than  he  shook  off  the  detaining 
hands  of  the  man  behind  him  and  fled 
to  the  rear  to  hold  on  to  his  neighbor. 
However  ludicrous  this  may  have  look- 
ed, it  was  still  very  natural  with  the  muz- 
zle of  a  half-loaded  cannon  pointing  full 
toward  you,  and  one  is  thankful  to  know 
that  with  such  dangerous  weapons  around 
no  serious  harm  was  done.  If  you  could 
only  see  the  fellow-countrymen  of  these 
heroes,  you  would  appreciate  the  story 
better  —  their  wonderful  diversity  of 
height,  their  equally  marvelous  diversity 
of  breadth,  of  garb  and  equipment.  One 
man  will  be  over  six  feet  high,  a  giant 
in  form  and  build,  mounted  on  a  splen- 
did saddle  fresh  from  the  store,  spick 
and  span  in  all  details.  His  neighbor  in 
the  ranks  will  be  five  feet  nothing,  and 
an  absolute  circle  as  to  shape :  he  will 
have  rolled  with  difficulty  on  to  the  back 
of  a  gaunt  steed,  and  his  horse  furniture 
will  consist  of  two  old  saddle-flaps  sewn 
together  with  a  strip  of  bullock-hide,  and 
with  a  sheepskin  thrown  over  all.  You 
may  imagine  that  a  regiment  thus  turn- 
ed out  would  look  somewhat  droll  to  the 
eyes  of  a  martinet  in  such  matters,  even 
without  the  addition  of  a  cannon  lying 
on  its  back  kicking,  or  a  twirling  rocket- 
tube  sputtering  and  fizzing. 

JUNE  7. 

Let  me  see  what  we  have  been  doing 
since  I  last  wrote.  I  have  had  a  Kafir 
princess  to  tea  with  me,  and  we  have 
killed  a  snake  in  the  baby's  nursery. 
That  is  to  say,  Jack  killed  the  snake. 
Jack  does  everything  in  the  house,  and 
is  at  once  the  most  amiable  and  the  clev- 
erest servant  I  ever  had.  Not  Zulu  Jack. 
He  is  so  deaf,  poor  boy !  he  is  not  of 
much  use  except  to  clean  saucepans  and 
wash  up  pots  and  pans.  He  seems  to 
have  no  sense  of  smell  either,  because  I 
have  to  keep  a  strict  watch  over  him  that 
he  does  not  introduce  a  flavor  of  kerosene 
oil  into  everything  by  his  partiality  for 
wiping  cups  and  plates  with  dirty  lamp- 
cloths  instead  of  his  own  nice  clean  dust- 
ers. But  he  is  very  civil  and  quiet,  lei- 
surely in  all  he  does,  and  a  strict  conser- 
vative in  his  notions  of  work,  resenting 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


95 


the  least  change  of  employment.  No  : 
the  other  Jack  is  a  tiny  little  man,  also 
a  Zulu,  but  he  speaks  English  well,  and 
it  is  his  pride  and  delight  to  dress  as  an 
English  "boy" — that  is  what  he  calls  it 
—  even  to  the  wearing  of  agonizingly 
tight  boots  on  his  big  feet.  Jack  learns 
all  I  can  teach  him  of  cooking  with  per- 
fect ease,  and  gives  us  capital  meals. 
He  is  the  bravest  of  the  establishment, 
and  is  always  to  the  fore  in  a  scrimmage, 
generally  dealing  the  coiip  de  grace  in 
all  combats  with  snakes.  In  this  in- 
stance my  first  thought  was  to  call  Jack. 
I  had  tried  to  open  the  nursery-door  one 
sunny  midday  to  see  if  the  baby  was  still 
asleep,  and  could  not  imagine  what  it 
was  pressing  so  hard  against  the  door 
and  preventing  my  opening  it.  I  deter- 
mined to  see,  and  lo !  round  the  edge 
darted  the  head  of  a  large  snake,  held 
well  up  in  air,  with  the  forked  tongue 
out.  He  must  have  been  trying  to  get 
out  of  the  room,  but  I  shut  the  door  in 
his  face  and  called  for  Jack,  arming  my- 
self with  my  riding -whip.  Jack  came 
running  up  instantly,  but  declined  all 
offers  of  walking-sticks  from  the  hall, 
having  no  confidence  in  English  sticks, 
and  preferring  to  trust  only  to  his  own 
light  strong  staff.  Cautiously  we  opened 
the  door  again,  but  the  snake  was  drawn 
up  in  battle-array,  coiled  in  a  corner  dif- 
ficult to  get  at,  and  with  outstretched 
neck  and  darting  head.  Jack  advanced 
boldly,  and  fenced  a  little  with  the  crea- 
ture, pretending  to  strike  it,  but  when  he 
saw  a  good  moment  he  dealt  one  shrewd 
blow  which  proved  sufficient.  Then  I 
suddenly  became  very  courageous  (after 
Jack  had  cried  with  a  grin  of  modest 
pride,  "Him  dead  now,  inkosa-casa") 
and  hit  him  several  cuts  with  my  whip, 
just  to  show  my  indignation  at  his  hav- 
ing dared  to  invade  the  nursery  and  to 
drink  up  a  cup  of  milk  left  for  the  baby. 
Baby  woke  up,  and  was  delighted  with 
the  scrimmage,  being  extremely  anxious 
to  examine  the  dead  snake,  now  dang- 
ling across  Jack's  stick.  We  all  went 
about  with  fear  and  suspicion  after  that 
for  some  days,  as  the  rooms  all  open  on 
to  the  verandah,  and  the  snakes  are  very 
fond  of  finding  a  warm,  quiet  corner  to 


hibernate  in.  There  is  now  a  strict  search 
instituted  into  all  recesses  —  into  cup- 
boards, behind  curtains,  and  especially 
into  F 's  tall  riding -boots  —  but  al- 
though several  snakes  have  been  seen 
and  killed  quite  close  to  the  house,  I  am 
bound  to  say  this  is  the  only  one  which 
has  come  in-doors.  Frogs  hop  in  when- 
ever they  can,  and  frighten  us  out  of  our 
lives  by  jumping  out  upon  us  in  the  dark, 
as  we  always  think  it  is  a  snake  and  not 
a  frog  which  startles  us.  It  requires  a 
certain  amount  of  persuasion  and  re- 
monstrance now  to  induce  any  of  us  to 
go  into  a  room  first  in  the  dark,  and 
there  have  been  many  false  alarms  and 
needless  shrieks  caused  by  the  lash  of 

one  of  G 's  many  whips,  or  even  a 

boot-lace,  getting  trodden  upon  in  the 
dark. 

My  Kafir  princess  listened  courteous- 
ly to  a  highly  dramatic  narrative  of  this 
snake  adventure  as  conveyed  to  her 
through  the  medium  of  Maria.  But  then 
she  listened  courteously  to  everything, 
and  was  altogether  as  perfect  a  specimen 
of  a  well-bred  young  lady  as  you  would 
wish  to  see  anywhere.  Dignified  and 
self-possessed,  without  the  slightest  self- 
assumption  or  consciousness,  with  the 
walk  of  an  empress  and  the  smile  of  a 
child,  such  was  Mazikali,  a  young  wid- 
ow about  twenty  years  of  age,  whose 
husband  (I  can  neither  spell  nor  pro- 
nounce his  name)  had  been  chief  of  the 
Putili  tribe,  whose  location  is  far  away 
to  the  north-west  of  us,  by  Bushman's 
River,  right  under  the  shadow  of  the 
great  range  of  the  Drakensberg.  This 
tribe  came  to  grief  in  the  late  disturb- 
ances apropos  of  Langalibalele,  and  lost 
all  their  cattle,  and  what  Mr.  Wemmick 
would  call  their  "portable  property,"  in 
some  unexplained  way.  We  evidently 
consider  that  it  was  what  the  Scotch  call 
"our  blame,"  for  every  year  there  is  a 
grant  of  money  from  our  colonial  ex- 
chequer to  purchase  this  tribe  ploughs 
and  hoes,  blankets  and  mealies,  and  so 
forth,  but  whilst  the  crops  are  growing  it 
is  rather  hard  times  for  them,  and  their 
pretty  chieftainess  occasionally  comes 
down  to  Maritzburg  to  represent  some 
particular  case  of  suffering  or  hardship 


96 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


to  their  kind  friend  the  minister  for  na- 
tive affairs,  who  is  always  the  man  they 
fly  to  for  help  in  all  their  troubles.  Poor 
girl !  she  is  going  through  an  anxious 
time  keeping  the  clanship  open  for  her 
only  son,  a  boy  five  years  old,  whom  she 
proudly  speaks  of  as  "  Captain  Lucas," 
but  whose  real  name  is  Luke. 

I  was  drinking  my  afternoon  tea  as 
usual  in  the  verandah  one  cold  Sunday 
afternoon  lately  when  Mazikali  paid  me 
this  visit,  so  I  had  a  good  view  of  her  as 
she  walked  up  the  drive  attended  by  her 
maid  of  honor  (one  of  whose  duties  is  to 
remove  stones  and  other  obstructions 
from  her  lady's  path),  and  closely  fol- 
lowed by  about  a  dozen  elderly,  grave 
"ringed"  men,  who  never  leave  her, 
and  are,  as  it  were,  her  body-guard. 
There  was  something  very  pretty  and 
pathetic,  to  any  one  knowing  how  a  Ka- 
fir woman  is  despised  by  her  lords  and 
masters,  in  the  devotion  and  anxious 
care  and  respect  which  these  tall  war- 
riors and  councilors  paid  to  this  gentle- 
eyed,  grave-faced  girl.  Their  pride  and 
delight  in  my  reception  of  her  were  the 
most  touching  things  in  the  world.  I 
went  to  meet  her  as  she  walked  at  the 
head  of  her  followers  with  her  graceful 
carriage  and  queenly  gait.  She  gave  me 
her  hand,  smiling  charmingly,  and  I  led 
her  up  the  verandah  steps  and  placed 
her  in  a  large  arm-chair,  and  two  or  three 
gentlemen  who  chanced  to  be  there 
raised  their  hats  to  her.  The  delight  of 
her  people  at  all  this  knew  no  bounds : 
their  keen  dusky  faces  glowed  with  pride, 
and  they  raised  their  right  hands  in  salu- 
tation before  sitting  down  on  the  edge  of 
the  verandah,  all  facing  their  mistress, 
and  hardly  taking  their  eyes  off  her  for 
a  moment.  Maria  came  to  interpret  for 
us,  which  she  did  very  prettily,  smiling 
sweetly ;  but  the  great  success  of  the  af- 
fair came  from  the  baby,  who  toddled 
round  the  corner,  and  seeing  this  bright- 
ly-draped figure  in  a  big  chair,  threw  up 
his  little  hand  and  cried  "Bayete!"  It 
was  quite  a  happy  thought,  and  was  rap- 
turously received  by  the  indunas  with 
loud  shouts  of  "Inkosi!  inkosi !"  whilst 
even  the  princess  looked  pleased  in  her 
composed  manner.  I  offered  her  some 


tea,  which  she  took  without  milk,  man- 
aging her  cup  and  saucer,  and  even 
spoon,  as  if -she  had  been  used  to  it  all 
her  life,  though  I  confess  to  a  slight  feel- 
ing of  nervousness,  remembering  the 
brittle  nature  of  china  as  compared  to 
calabashes  or  to  Kafir  wooden  bowls. 

F gave  each  of  her  retinue  a  cigar, 

which  they  immediately  crumbled  up 
and  took  in  the  form  of  snuff  with  many 
grateful  grunts  of  satisfaction. 

Now,  there  is  nothing  in  the  world 
which  palls  so  soon  as  compliments,  and 
our  conversation,  being  chiefly  of  this 
nature,  began  to  languish  dreadfully. 
Maria  had  conveyed  to  the  princess  sev- 
eral times  my  pleasure  in  receiving  her, 
and  my  hope  that  she  and  her  people 
would  get  over  this  difficult  time  and 
prosper  everlastingly.  To  this  the  prin- 
cess had  answered  that  her  heart  re- 
joiced at  having  had  its  own  way,  and 
directed  her  up  the  hill  which  led  to  my 
house,  and  that  even  after  she  had  de- 
scended the  path  again,  it  would  eternal- 
ly remember  the  white  lady.  This  was 
indeed  a  figure  of  speech,  for  by  dint  of 
living  in  the  verandah,  rushing  out  after 
the  children,  and  my  generally  gypsy 
habits,  Mazikali  is  not  very  much  dark- 
er than  I  am.  All  this  time  the  little 
maid  of  honor  had  sat  shivering  close 
by,  munching  a  large  slice  of  cake  and 
staring  with  her  big  eyes  at  my  English 
nurse.  She  now  broke  silence  by  a  fear- 
fully distinct  inquiry  as  to  whether  that 
other  white  woman  was  not  a  secondary 
or  subsidiary  wife.  This  question  set 
Maria  off  into  such  fits  of  laughter,  and 
covered  poor  little  Nanna  with  so  much 
confusion,  that  as  a  diversion  I  brought 
forward  my  gifts  to  the  princess,  consist- 
ing of  a  large  crystal  cross  and  a  pair  of 
.ear-rings.  The  reason  I  gave  her  these 
ornaments  was  because  I  heard  she  had 
parted  with  everything  of  that  sort  she 
possessed  in  the  world  to  relieve  the  dis- 
tresses of  her  people.  The  cross  hung 
upon  a  bright  ribbon  which  I  tied  round 
her  throat.  All  her  followers  sprang  to 
their  feet,  waved  their  sticks  and  cried, 
"Hail  to  the  chieftainess !"  But,  alas! 
there  was  a  professional  beggar  attached 
to  the  party,  who  evidently  considered 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


97 


the  opportunity  as  too  good  to  be  lost, 
and  drew  Maria  aside,  suggesting  that  as 
the  white  lady  was  evidently  enormous- 
ly rich  and  very  foolish,  it  would  be  as 
well  to  mention  that  the  princess  had 
only  skins  of  wild  beasts  to  wear  (she 
had  on  a  petticoat  or  kilt  of  lynx-skins, 
and  her  shoulders  were  wrapped  in  a 
gay  striped  blanket,  which  fell  in  grace- 
ful folds  nearly  to  her  feet),  and  suffered 
horribly  from  cold.  He  added  that  there 
never  was  such  a  tiresome  girl,  for  she 
never  would  ask  for  anything ;  and  how 
was  she  to  get  it  without  ?  Besides  which, 
if  she  had  such  a  dislike  to  asking  for 
herself,  she  surely  might  speak  about 
things  for  them :  an  old  coat,  now,  or  a 
hat,  would  be  highly  acceptable  to  him- 
self, and  so  would  a  little  money.  But 
Mazikali  turned  quite  fiercely  on  him,  or- 
dering him  to  hold  his  tongue,  and  de- 
manding if  that  was  the  way  to  receive 
kindness,  by  asking  for  more? 

The  beggar's  remark,  however,  had 
the  effect  of  drawing  my  attention  to 
the  princess's  scanty  garb.  I  have  said 
it  was  a  bitterly  cold  evening,  and  so  the 
maid  of  honor  pronounced  it,  shivering ; 
so  Nurse  and  I  went  to  our  boxes  and 
had  a  good  hunt,  returning  with  a  warm 
knitted  petticoat,  a  shawl  and  two  sets 
of  flannel  bathing  -  dresses.  One  was 
perfectly  new,  of  crimson  flannel  trim- 
med with  a  profusion  of  white  braid.  Of 
course  this  was  for  the  princess,  and  she 
and  her  maiden  retired  to  Maria's  room 
and  equipped  themselves,  finding  much 
difficulty,  however,  in  getting  into  the 
bathing-suits,  and  marveling  much  at 
the  perplexing  fashion  in  which  white 
women  made  their  clothes.  The  maid 
of  honor  was  careful  to  hang  her  solitary 
decorations,  two  small  round  bits  of  look- 
ing -  glass,  outside  her  skeleton  suit  of 
blue  serge,  and  we  found  her  an  old 
woolen  table-cover  which  she  arranged 
into  graceful  shawl-folds  with  one  clever 
twist  of  her  skinny  little  arm.  Just  as 
they  turned  to  leave  the  room,  Maria 
told  me,  this  damsel  said,  "  Now,  ma'am, 
if  we  only  had  a  little  red  earth  to  color 
our  foreheads,  and  a  few  brass  rings,  we 
should  look  very  nice  ;"  but  the  princess 
rejoined,  "Whatever  you  do,  don't  ask 
7 


for  anything;"  which,  I  must  say,  I  thought 
very  nice.  So  I  led  her  back  again  to 
her  watchful  followers,  who  hailed  her 
improved  appearance  with  loud  shouts 
of  delight.  She  then  took  her  leave  with 
many  simple  and  graceful  protestations 
of  gratitude,  but  I  confess  it  gave  me  a 
pang  when  she  said  with  a  sigh,  "Ah,  if 
all  white  inkosa-casas  were  like  you,  and 
kind  to  us  Kafir-women  !"  I  could  not 
help  thinking  how  little  I  had  really  done, 
and  how  much  more  we  might  all  do. 

I  must  mention  that,  by  way  of  amus- 
ing Mazikali,  I  had  shown  her  some  large 
photographs  of  the  queen  and  the  royal 
family,  explaining  to  her  very  carefully 
who  they  all  were.  She  looked  very  at- 
tentively at  Her  Majesty's  portrait,  and 
then  held  it  up  to  her  followers,  who  rose 
of  their  own  accord  and  saluted  it  with 
the  royal  greeting  of  "Bayete !"  and  as 
Mazikali  laid  it  down  again  she  remark- 
ed pensively,  "  I  am  very  glad  the  great 
white  chieftainess  has  such  a  kind  face. 
I  should  not  be  at  all  afraid  of  going  to 
tell  her  any  of  my  troubles  :  I  am  sure 
she  is  a  kind  and  good  lady."  Mazikali 
herself  admired  the  princess  of  Wales' 
portrait  immensely,  and  gazed  at  it  for  a 
long  time,  but  I  am  sorry  to  say  her  fol- 
lowers persisted  in  declaring  it  was  only 
a  very  pretty  girl,  and  reserved  all  their 
grunts  and  shouts  of  respectful  admi- 
ration for  a  portrait  of  the  duke  of  Cam- 
bridge in  full  uniform.  "  Oh  !  the  great 
fighting  inkosi !  Look  at  his  sword  and 
the  feathers  in  that  beautiful  hat !  How 
the  hearts  of  his  foes  must  melt  away 
before  his  terrible  and  splendid  face !" 
But  indeed  on  each  portrait  they  had 
some  shrewd  remark  to  make,  tracing 
family  likenesses  with  great  quickness, 
and  asking  minute  questions  about  re- 
lationship, succession,  etc.  They  took 
a  special  interest  in  hearing  about  the 
prince  of  Wales  going  to  India,  and  im- 
mediately wished  His  Royal  Highness 
would  come  here  and  shoot  buffalo  and 
harte-beeste. 

JUNE  15. 

We  had  such  a  nice  Cockney  family 
picnic  ten  days  ago,  on  Whit-Monday ! 
F had  been  bewailing  himself  about 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


this  holiday  beforehand,  declaring  he 
should  not  know  what  to  do  with  him- 
self, and  regretting  that "  holidays  had 
ever  been  invented,  and  so  on,  until  I 
felt  that  it  was  absolutely  necessary  to 
provide  him  with  some  out-door  occupa- 
tion for  the  day.  There  was  no  anxiety 
about  the  weather,  for  it  is  only  too  "set 
fair"  all  round,  and  the  water  shrinks 
away  and  the  dust  increases  upon  us  day 
by  day.  But  there  was  an  anxiety  about 
where  to  go  and  how  to  get  to  any  place. 
"Such  a  bad  road!"  was  the  objection 
raised  to  every  place  I  proposed,  or  else 
it  was  voted  too  far.  At  last  all  difficul- 
ties were  met  by  a  suggestion  of  spend- 
ing a  "happy  day"  at  the  falls  of  the 
lower  Umgeni,  only  a  dozen  miles  away, 
and  the  use  of  the  mule-wagon.  Every- 
thing was  propitious,  even  to  the  mate- 
rials for  a  cold  dinner  being  handy,  and 
we  bundled  in  ever  so  many  boys,  Nurse 
and  myself,  and  Maria  in  her  brightest 
cotton  frock  and  literally  beaming  with 
smiles,  which  every  now  and  then  broke 
out  into  a  joyous,  childish  laugh  of  pure 
delight  at  nothing  at  all.  She  came  to 
carry  the  baby,  who  loves  her  better  than 
any  one,  and  who  understands  Kafir  bet- 
ter than  English.  The  great  thing  was, 
that  everybody  had  the  companions  they 
liked :  as  I  have  said,  Baby  had  his  Ma- 
ria, F had  secured  a  pleasant  friend 

to  ride  with  him,  so  as  to  be  independent 
of  the  wagon,  G had  his  two  favor- 
ite little  schoolfellows,  and  I — well,  I  had 
the  luncheon  -basket,  and  that  was  quite 
enough  for  me  to  think  of.  I  kept  re- 
membering spasmodically  divers  omis- 
sions made  in  the  hurry  of  packing  it 
up ;  for,  like  all  pleasant  parties,  it  was 
quite  a  riwprevu,  and  that  made  me 
rather  anxious.  It  was  really  a  delicious 
morning,  sunny  and  yet  cool,  with  every- 
thing around  looking  bright  and  glowing 
under  the  beautiful  light.  The  near  hills 
seemed  to  fold  the  little  quiet  town  in 
soft  round  curves  melting  and  blending 
into  each  other,  whilst  the  ever-rising  and 
more  distant  outlines  showed  exquisite 
indigo  shadows  and  bold  relief  of  purple 
and  brown.  The  greenery  of  spring  and 
summer  is  all  parched  and  dried  away 
now,  but  the  red  African  soil  takes  in 


the  distance  warm  hues  and  tints  which 
make  up  for  the  delicate  coloring  of 
young  grass.  Here  and  there,  as  it 
glows  beneath  the  sun  and  a  slow-sail- 
ing cloud  casts  a  shadow,  it  changes 
from  its  own  rich  indescribable  color  to 
the  purple  of  a  heather-covered  Scotch 
moor,  but  while  one  looks  the  cloud  has 
passed  away,  the  violet  tints  die  out,  and 
it  is  again  a  bare  red  hillside  which  lies 
before  you.  A  steep  hillside,  too,  for  the 
poor  mules,  but  they  breast  it  bravely  at 
a  jog  trot,  with  their  jangling  bells  and 
patient  bowed  heads,  and  we  are  soon  at 
the  top,  looking  down  on  the  clouds  of 
our  own  dust.  The  wind — or  rather  the 
soft  air,  for  it  is  hardly  a  wind — blows 
straight  in  our  faces  as  we  trot  on  toward 
the  south-west,  and  it  drives  the  mass  of 
finely-powdered  dust  raised  by  the  heels 
of  the  six  mules  far  behind  us,  to  our 
great  contentment  and  comfort.  The 
two  gentlemen  on  horseback  are  fain  to 
keep  clear  of  us  and  our  dust,  and  to  take 
a  short  cut  whenever  they  can  get  off  the 
highroad,  which  in  this  case  and  at  this 
time  of  year  is  really  a  very  good  one. 
Inside  the  wagon,  under  the  high  hood, 
it  is  deliciously  cool,  but  the  boys  are  in 
such  tearing  spirits  that  I  don't  know 
what  to  do  with  them.  Every  now  and 
then,  when  we  are  going  up  hill,  they 
jump  out  of  the  wagon  and  search  the 
hillside  for  a  yellow  flower,  a  sort  of  ev- 
erlasting, out  of  the  petals  of  which  they 
extemporize  shrill  whistles  ;  and  when 
their  invention  in  this  line  falls  short, 
Maria  steps  in  with  a  fresh  suggestion. 
They  make  fearful  pipes  of  reeds,  they 
chirp  like  the  grasshoppers,  they  all  chat- 
ter and  laugh  together  like  so  many  mag- 
pies. When  I  am  quite  at  my  wits'  end  I 
produce  buns,  and  these  keep  them  quiet 
for  full  five  minutes,  but  not  longer. 

At  last,  after  two  hours'  steady  up-hiJl 
pulling  on  the  part  of  the  mules,  we  have 
reached  the  great  plateau  from  which  the 
Umgeni  takes  its  second  leap,  the  first 
being  at  Howick.  There,  the  sight  of  the 
great  river  rolling  wide  and  swift  between 
its  high  banks  keeps  the  boys  quiet  with 
surprise  and  delight  for  a  short  space, 
and  before  they  have  found  their  tongues 
again  the  wagon  has  noisily  crossed  a  re- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


99 


sounding  wooden  bridge  and  drawn  up 
at  the  door  of  an  inn.  Here  the  mules 
find  rest  and  shelter,  as  well  as  their 
Hottentot  drivers,  whilst  we  are  only  be- 
ginning our  day's  work.  As  for  the  boys, 
their  whole  souls  are  absorbed  in  their 
fishing  -  rods :  they  grudge  the  idea  of 
wasting  time  in  eating  dinner,  and  stip- 
ulate earnestly  that  they  may  be  allow- 
ed to  "eat  fast."  We  find  and  charter 
a  couple  of  tall  Kafirs  to  carry  the  pro- 
vision-baskets ;  F and  his  compan- 
ion take  careful  and  tender  charge  each 
of  a  bottle  of  beer ;  Maria  shoulders  the 
baby  ;  I  cling  to  my  little  teapot ;  Nurse 
seizes  a  bottle  of  milk,  and  away  we  all 
go  down  the  dusty  road  again,  over  the 
bridge  (the  boys  don't  want  to  go  a  yard 
farther,  for  they  see  some  Kafirs  fish- 
ing below),  across  a  burnt-up  meadow, 
through  scrub  of  terrible  thorniness,  and 
so  on,  guided  by  the  rush  and  roar  of 
the  falling  water,  to  our  dining-room 
among  the  great  boulders  beneath  the 
shade  of  the  chief  cascade.  Unlike  the 
one  grand,  concentrated  leap  of  the  riv- 
er we  saw  at  Ho  wick,  here  it  tumbles  in 
a  dozen  places  over  a  wide  semicircular 
ledge  of  basalt.  It  is  no  joke  to  any  one 
except  the  boys  —  who  seem  to  enjoy 
tumbling  about  and  grazing  their  elbows 
and  chins — getting  over  the  wet,  slippery 
rocks  which  have  to  be  crossed  to  get  to 
the  place  we  want.  I  tremble  for  the 
milk  and  the  beer,  and  the  teapot  and 
I  slip  down  repeatedly,  but  I  am  under 
no  apprehension  about  Maria  and  the 
baby,  for  she  plants  her  broad,  big,  bare 
feet  firmly  on  the  rocks,  and  steps  over 
their  wet,  slippery  surface  with  the  ease 
and  grace  of  a  stout  gazelle.  Once,  and 
once  only,  is  she  in  danger,  but  it  is  be- 
cause she  is  laughing  so  immoderately 
at  the  baby's  suggestion,  made  in  lisping 
Kafir  when  he  first  caught  sight  of  the 
waterfall,  that  we  should  all  have  a  bath 
there  and  then. 

The  falls  are  not  in  their  fullest  splen- 
dor to-day,  for  this  is  the  dry  season,  and 
even  the  great  Umgeni  acknowledges  the 
drain  of  burning  sunshine  day  after  day, 
and  is  rather  more  economical  in  her 
display  of  tumbling  water  and  iridescent 
spray.  Still,  all  is  very  beautiful,  and  in 


spite  of  our  hunger — for  we  are  all  well- 
nigh  ravenous — we  climb  various  rocks 
of  vantage  to  see  the  fine  semicircle  of 
cascades  gleaming  white  among  tufts  of 
green  scrub  and  massive  boulders.  In 
the  wet  season,  of  course,  much  that  we 
see  now  of  rock  and  tree  is  hidden  by 
the  greater  volume  of  water,  but  they 
add  greatly  to  the  sylvan  beauty  of  the 
fair  scene.  It  is  quite  cold  in  the  shade, 
but  we  have  no  choice,  for  where  the  sun 
shines  invitingly  there  is  not  a  foot  of 
level  rock  and  not  an  inch  of  soft  white 
sand  like  the  floor  of  our  dining-room. 
Such  an  indignant  twitter  as  the  birds 
raise,  hardly  to  be  pacified  by  crumbs 
and  scraps  of  the  rapidly- vanishing  bread 
and  meat,  salad  and  pudding  !  But  the 
days  are  so  short  now  that  we  cannot 
spare  ourselves  half  the  time  we  want 
either  to  eat  or  rest,  or  to  linger  and  lis- 
ten to  the  great  monotonous  roar  of  fall- 
ing water,  so  agitating  at  first,  so  sooth- 
ing after  a  little  while.  The  boys  have 
bolted  their  dinner,  plunged  their  heads 
and  hands  under  a  tiny  tricklet  close  by, 
and  are  off  to  the  shallows  beneath  the 
bridge,  where  the  river  runs  wide  and 
low,  where  geese  are  cackling  on  the 
boulders,  fish  leaping  in  the  pools,  and 
Kafir  lads  laughing  and  splashing  on  the 
brink.  We  leave  Baby  and  his  nurse  in 
charge  of  the  birds'  dinner  until  the  men 
return  for  the  lightened  baskets,  and  we 
three  "grown-ups"  start  for  a  sharp  scram- 
ble up  the  face  of  the  cliff,  over  the  bed 
of  a  dry  watercourse,  to  look  at  the  won- 
derful expanse  of  the  great  river  coming 
down  from  the  purple  hills  on  the  hori- 
zon, sweeping  across  the  vast,  almost 
level,  plain  in  a  magnificent  tranquil 
curve,  wide  as  an  inland  lake,  until  it 
falls  abruptly  over  the  precipice  before 
it.  Scarcely  a  ripple  on  the  calm  sur- 
face, scarcely  a  quickening  of  its  steady, 
tranquil  flow,  and  yet  it  has  gone,  drop- 
ped clean  out  of  sight,  and  that  monot- 
onous roar  is  the  noise  of  its  fall.  I 
should  like  to  see  it  in  summer,  when  its 
stately  progress  is  quickened  and  its  lim- 
pid waters  stained  by  the  overflow  of 
countless  lesser  streams  into  its  broad 
bosom,  and  when  its  banks  are  fringed 
with  tufts  of  tall  white  arum  lilies  —  now 


100 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


only  green  folded  leaves,  shrunken  as 
close  to  the  water's  edge  as  they  can  get 
— and  when  the  carpet  of  violets  beneath 
our  feet  is  a  sheet  of  blossom  flecked  with 
gayer  flowers  all  over  this  great  spread- 
ing veldt.  To-day  the  wish  of  my  heart, 
of  all  our  hearts,  is  for  a  canoe  apiece. 
Oh  for  the  days  of  fairy  thievery,  to  be 
able  to  swoop  down  upon  Mr.  Searle's 
yard  and  snatch  up  three  perfect  little 
canoes,  paddles,  sails,  waterproof  aprons 
and  all,  and  put  them  down  over  there 
by  that  clump  of  lilies  and  crimson 
bushes  !  What  a  race  we  could  have  for 
clear  eight  miles  up  that  shining  reach, 
between  banks  which  are  never  nearer 
than  sixty  or  seventy  feet  to  each  other, 
and  where  the  river  is  as  smooth  as  glass, 
and  free  from  let  or  hindrance  to  a  canoe 
for  all  that  distance  !  But,  alas  !  there 
are  neither  roguish  fairies  nor  stolen  ca- 
noes to  be  seen — nothing  except  one's 
rough-and-ready  fishing-rod  and  the  ev- 
erlasting mealie-meal  worked  into  a  paste 
for  bait.  We  are  too  impatient  to  give  it 
a  fair  trial,  although  the  fish  are  leaping 
all  around,  for  already  the  sun  is  travel- 
ing fast  toward  those  high  western  hills, 
and  when  once  he  gets  behind  the  tallest 
of  the  peaks  darkness  will  be  upon  us 
in  five  minutes.  We  should  be  much 
more  careful  of  our  minutes  even,  did 
there  not  chance  to  be  an  early  moon, 
already  a  silver  disk  in  yonder  bright 
blue  sky.  The  homeward  path  is  longer 
and  easier,  and  leads  us  more  circuitous- 
ly  back  to  the  bridge,  beneath  which  I 

am  horrified  to  find  G and  his  friends, 

their  fishing-rods  and  one  small  fish  on 
the  bank,  disporting  themselves  in  the 
water,  with  nothing  on  save  their  hats. 

G is  not  at  all  dismayed  at  my  shrill 

reproaches  to  him  from  the  high  bridge 
above,  but  suggests  that  I  should  throw 
him  down  my  pocket  handkerchief  for  a 
towel,  and  promises  to  dress  and  come 
up  to  the  house  directly.  So  I,  with  the 
thoughts  of  my  tea  in  my  mind — for  we 
have  not  been  able  to  have  a  fire  at  the 
falls — hurry  up  to  the  inn,  and  have  time 
for  a  look  round  before  the  boys  are 
ready.  It  is  all  so  odd — such  a  strange 
jumble,  such  a  thorough  example  of  the 
queer  upside-down  fashion  of  colonizing 


which  reigns  here  —  that  I  cannot  help 
describing  it.  A  fairly  good,  straggling 
house  with  sufficiently  good  furniture, 
and  plenty  of  it,  and  an  apparent  abun- 
dance of  good  glass  and  crockery.  A 
sort  of  bar  also,  with  substantial  array 
of  bottles  and  tins  of  biscuits  and  pre- 
served meats  and  pickles  of  all  sorts  and 
kinds.  But  what  I  want  you  to  bear  in 
mind  is,  that  all  this  came  from  England, 
and  has  finally  been  brought  up  here, 
nearly  seventy  miles  from  the  coast,  at 
an  enormous  trouble  and  expense.  There 
are  several  young  white  people  about 
the  place,  but  a  person  of  that  class  in 
Natal  is  too  fine  to  work,  and  in  five  min- 
utes I  hear  fifty  complaints  of  want  of 
labor  and  of  the  idleness  of  the  Kafirs. 
There  is  no  garden,  no  poultry  -  yard, 
no  dairy.  Here,  with  the  means  of  irri- 
gation at  their  very  doors,  with  the  pos- 
sibility of  food  for  cattle  all  the  year 
round  at  the  cost  of  a  little  personal 
trouble,  there  is  neither  a  drop  of  milk 
nor  an  ounce  of  butter  to  be  had.  Nor 
an  egg:  "The  fowls  don't  do  so  very 
well."  I  should  think  not,  with  such  ac- 
commodation as  they  have  in  the  way  of 
water  and  food.  For  more  than  twenty 
years  that  house  has  stood  there,  a  gen- 
eration has  grown  up  around  it  and  in  it, 
and  yet  it  might  as  well  have  been  built 
last  year  for  all  the  signs  of  a  homestead 
about  it.  There  is  somewhere  a  mealie- 
patch,  and  perhaps  a  few  acres  of  green 
forage,  and  that  is  all.  Now,  in  Austra- 
lia or  New  Zealand,  in  a  more  rigor- 
ous climate,  under  far  greater  disadvan- 
tages, the  dwellers  in  that  house  would 
have  had  farmyard  and  grain-fields,  gar- 
den and  poultry-yard,  about  them  in  five 
years,  and  all  the  necessary  labor  would 
have  been  performed  by  the  master  and 
mistress  and  their  sons  and  daughters. 
Here  they  all  sit  in-doors,  listless  and 
discontented,  grumbling  because  the 
Kafirs  won't  come  and  work  for  them. 
I  can't  make  it  out,  and  I  confess  I  long 
to  give  all  this  sort  of  colonists  a  good 
shaking,  and  take  away  every  single 
Kafir  from  them.  I  am  sure  they  would 
get  on  a  thousand  times  better.  The 
only  thing  is,  it  is  too  late  to  shake  en- 
ergy and  thrift  into  elderly  or  already 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


101 


grown-tjp  people.  They  get  on  very 
well  as  it  is,  they  say,  and  make  money, 
which  is  all  they  care  for,  having  no 
pride  in  neatness  or  order,  and  setting 
no  value  on  the  good  opinion  of  others. 
They  can  sell  their  beer  and  pickles  and 
tins  of  meat  and  milk  at  double  and 
treble  what  they  cost ;  and  that  is  less 
fatiguing  than  digging  and  fencing  and 
churning.  So  the  tea  has  no  milk  and 
the  bread  no  butter  where  twenty  years 
ago  cows  were  somewhere  about  five 
shillings  apiece,  and  we  get  on  as  well 
as  we  can  without  them  ;  but  I  long,  up 
to  the  very  last,  to  shake  them  all  round, 
especially  the  fat,  pallid  young  people. 
Fortunately  for  Her  Majesty's  peace,  I 
refrain  from  this  expression  of  my  opin- 
ion, and  get  myself  and  all  my  boys  into 
the  mule-wagon,  and  so  off  again,  jog- 
ging homeward  before  the  sun  has  dip- 
ped behind  that  great  blue  hill.  Long 
ere  we  have  gone  halfway  the  daylight 
has  all  died  away,  and  the  boys  find 
fresh  cause  for  shouts  of  delight  at  the 
fantastic  shadows  the  moon  casts  as  she 
glides  in  and  out  of  her  cloud-palaces. 

It  would  have  been  an  enchanting  drive 
home,  wrapped  up  to  the  chin  as  we  all 
were,  except  for  the  dust.  What  air  there 
was  came  from  behind  us,  from  the  same 
point  as  it  had  blown  in  the  morning,  but 
now  we  carried  the  dust  along  with  us, 
and  were  powdered  snow-white  by  it. 
Every  hundred  yards  or  so  the  drivers 
put  on  the  brake  and  whistled  to  the 


mules  to  stop.  They  did  not  mind  losing 
sight  altogether  of  the  leaders  in  a  dense 
cloud  of  dust,  nor  even  of  the  next  pair, 
but  when  the  wheelers  were  completely 
blotted  out  by  the  thick  stirred-up  mass 
of  fine  dust,  then  they  thought  it  high  time 
to  pause  and  let  it  blow  past  us.  But  all 
this  stopping  made  the  return  journey 
rather  long  and  tedious,  and  all  the  curly 
little  heads  were  nodding  on  our  shoul- 
ders, only  rousing  up  with  a  flicker  of 
the  day's  animation  when  we  came  to 
where  a  grass-fire  was  sweeping  over  the 
veldt,  and  our  road  a  dusty  but  wide  and 
safe  barrier  against  the  sheets  of  crack- 
ling flame.  All  along  the  horizon  these 
blazing  belts  showed  brightly  against  the 
deep  twilight  sky,  sometimes  racing  up 
the  hills,  again  lighting  up  the  valleys 
with  yellow  belt  and  circle  of  smoke  and 
fire,  but  everywhere  weird  and  picturesque 
beyond  the  power  of  words  to  tell. 

I  noticed  during  that  drive  what  I  have 
so  often  observed  out  here  before — the 
curious  layers  of  cold  air.  Sometimes 
we  felt  our  wraps  quite  oppressive :  gen- 
erally, this  was  when  we  were  at  the  top 
of  a  hill,  or  even  climbing  up  it :  then, 
when  we  were  crossing  a  valley  or  a  nar- 
row ravine,  we  seemed  to  drive  into  an 
ice-cold  region  where  we  shivered  be- 
neath our  furs ;  and  then  again  in  five 
minutes  the  air  would  once  more  be  soft 
and  balmy  —  crisp  and  bracing  indeed, 
but  many  degrees  warmer  than  those 
narrow  arctic  belts  here  and  there. 


MARITZBURG,  July  3,  187$. 

I  HAVE  seen  two  Kafir  weddings  late- 
ly, and,  oddly  enough,  by  the  merest 
chance  they  took  place  within  a  day  or 
two  of  each  other.  The  two  extremes 
of  circumstances,  the  rudest  barbarism 
and  the  culminating  smartness  of  civil- 
ization, seemed  to  jostle  each  other  be- 
fore my  very  eyes,  as  things  do  in  a 
dream.  And  they  went  backward,  too, 
to  make  it  more  perplexing,  for  it  was 
the  civilized  wedding  I  saw  first — the 
wedding  of  people  whose  mothers  had 
been  bought  for  so  many  cows,  and 
whose  marriage-rites  had  probably  been 
celebrated  with  a  stick,  for  your  Kafir 
bridegroom  does  not  understand  coy- 
ness, and  speedily  ends  the  romance  of 
courtship  by  a  few  timely  cuffs. 

Well,  then,  I  chanced  to  be  in  town 
one  of  these  fine  bright  winter  mornings 
(which  would  be  perfect  if  it  were  not  for 
the  dust),  and  I  saw  a  crowd  round  the 
porch  of  the  principal  church.  "What 
is  going  on?"  I  asked  naturally,  and 
heard,  in  broken  English  dashed  with 
Dutch  and  Kafir,  that  there  was  an 
"umtyado"  (excuse  phonetic  spelling), 
a"bruitlof,"  a"vedding."  Hardly  had 
I  gathered  the  meaning  of  all  these  terms 
— the  English  being  by  far  the  most  dif- 
ficult to  recognize,  for  they  put  a  click 
in  it — than  the  bridal  party  came  out  of 
church,  formed  themselves  into  an  order- 
ly procession  and  commenced  to  walk  up 
the  exceedingly  dusty  street  two  by  two. 
They  were  escorted  by  a  crowd  of  well- 
wishers  and  a  still  greater  crowd  of  spec- 
tators— more  or  less  derisive,  I  regret  to 
state.  But  nothing  upset  the  gravity  and 
decorum  of  the  bride  and  bridegroom, 
who  walked  first  with  a  perfectly  happy 
and  self-satisfied  expression  of  face. 
Uniforms  were  strictly  excluded,  and 
the  groom  and  his  male  friends  prided 
themselves  on  having  discarded  all  their 
miscellaneous  red  coats  for  the  day,  and ' 
on  being  attired  in  suits  of  ready-made 
102 


tweed,  in  which  they  looked  queerer 
than  words  can  say.  Boots  also  had 
they  on  their  feet,  to  their  huge  discom- 
fort, and  white  felt  soft  hats  stuck  more 
or  less  rakishly  on  their  elaborately 
combed  and  woolly  pates.  The  general 
effect  of  the  gentlemen,  I  am  sorry  to 
say,  was  that  of  the  Christy  Minstrels, 
but  the  ladies  made  up  for  everything. 
I  wish  you  could  have  seen  the  perfect 
ease  and  grace  of  the  bride  as  she  paced 
along  with  her  flowing  white  skirts  trail- 
ing behind  her  in  the  dust  and  her  lace 
veil  thrown  over  a  wreath  of  orange- 
flowers  and  hanging  to  the  ground.  It 
was  difficult  to  believe  that  probably  not 
long  ago  she  had  worn  a  sack  or  a  fold 
of  coarse  salempore  as  her  sole  clothing. 
She  managed  her  draperies,  all  snowy 
white  and  made  in  the  latest  fashion,  as 
if  she  had  been  used  to  long  gowns  all 
her  life,  and  carried  her  head  as  though 
it  had  never  known  red  clay  or  a  basket 
of  mealies.  I  could  not  see  her  features, 
but  face  and  throat  and  bare  arms  were 
all  as  black  as  jet,  and  shone  out  in 
strong  relief  from  among  her  muslin 
frills,  and  furbelows.  There  were  many 
yards  of  satin  ribbon  among  these  same 
frills,  and  plenty  of  artificial  flowers,  but 
everything  was  all  white,  shoes  and  all. 
I  am  afraid  she  had  "  disremembered " 
her  stockings.  The  principal  couple 
were  closely  followed  by  half  a  dozen 
other  pairs  of  sable  damsels,  also  "gown- 
ed in  pure  white"  and  made  wonderful 
with  many  bows  of  blue  ribbon.  Each 
maiden  was  escorted  by  a  groomsman, 
the  rear-guard  of  guests  trailing  off  into 
colored  cottons  and  patched  suits.  Ev- 
erybody looked  immensely  pleased  with 
him  and  herself,,  and  I  gradually  lost 
sight  of  them  in  the  unfailing  cloud  of 
dust  which  rises  on  the  slightest  provo- 
cation at  this  time  of  year.  I  assure  you 
it  was  a  great  event,  the  first  smart  wed- 
ding in  Maritzburg  among  the  Kafirs, 
and  I  only  hope  the  legal  part  is  all 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


103 


right,  and  that  the  bridegroom  won't  be 
free  to  bring  another  wife  home  some 
day  to  vex  the  soul  of  this  smart  lady. 
Kafir  marriage  -  laws  are  in  a  curious 
state,  and  present  one  of  the  greatest 
difficulties  in  the  process  of  grafting  civ- 
ilized habits  on  the  customs  of  utter  bar- 
barism. 

In  spite  of  the  imposing  appearance 
of  bride  and  bridegroom,  in  spite  of  the 
good  sign  all  this  aping  of  our  ways 
really  is,  in  spite  of  a  hundred  consider- 
ations of  that  nature  which  ought  to  have 
weighed  with  me,  but  did  not,  I  fear  I 
took  far  more  interest  in  a  real  Kafir 
marriage,  a  portion  of  whose  prelimin- 
ary proceedings  I  saw  two  days  after 
this  gala  procession  in  white  muslin  and 
gray  tweed.  I  was  working  in  the  ve- 
randah after  breakfast  —  for  you  must 
know  that  it  is  so  cold  in-doors  that  we 
all  spend  the  middle  part  of  the  day 
basking  like  lizards  in  the  delicious 
warmth  of  sunny  air  outside  —  when  I 
heard  a  distant  but  loud  noise  beyond 
the  sod  fence  between  us  and  a  track 
leading  over  the  hills,  in  whose  hollows 
many  a  Kafir  kraal  nestles  snugly.  I 
knew  it  must  be  something  unusual,  for 
I  saw  all  our  Kafirs  come  running  out 
in  a  state  of  great  excitement,  calling  to 

each  other  to  make  haste.     G too 

left  the  funeral  obsequies  of  a  cat-mur- 
dered pigeon  in  which  he  was  busily 
employed,  and  scampered  off  to  the 
gate,  shouting  to  me  to  come  and  see. 
So  I,  who  am  the  idlest  mortal  in  the 
world,  and  dearly  love  an  excuse  for 
leaving  whatever  rational  employment 
I  am  engaged  upon,  snatched  up  the 
baby,  who  was  supremely  happy  dig- 
ging in  the  dust  in  the  sunshine,  called 
Maria  in  case  there  might  be  anything 
to  explain,  and  ran  off  to  the  gate  also. 
But  there  was  nothing  to  be  seen,  not 
even  dust:  we  only  heard  a  sound  of 
monotonous  singing  and  loud  grunting 
coming  nearer  and  nearer,  and  by  and 
by  a  muffled  tread  of  bare  hurrying  feet 
shuffling  through  the  ,powdered  earth  of 
the  track.  My  own  people  had  clam- 
bered up  on  the  fence,  and  were  gestic- 
ulating wildly  and  laughing  and  shout; 
ing,  Tom  waving  the  great  wooden  spoon 


with  which  he  stirs  his  everlasting  "  scoff." 
"What  is  it,  Maria?"  I  asked.  Maria 
shook  her  head  and  looked  very  solemn, 
saying  "  I  doan  know,"  but  even  while  she 
spoke  a  broad  grin  broke  all  over  her  face, 
and  she  showed  her  exquisite  teeth  from 
ear  to  ear  as  she  said,  half  contemptu- 
ously, "  It's  only  a  wild  Kafir  wedding, 
lady.  There  are  the  warriors:  that's 
what  they  do  when  they  don't  know  any 
better."  Evidently,  Maria  inclined  to  the 
long  white  muslin  gown  of  the  civilized 
bride  which  I  had  so  minutely  described 
to  her,  and  she  turned  away  in  disdain. 
Yes,  here  they  come — first,  a  body  of 
stalwart  warriors  dressed  in  skins,  with 
immense  plumes  of  feathers  on  their 
heads,  their  lithe,  muscular  bodies  shin- 
ing like  ebony  as  they  flash  past  me — 
not  so  quickly,  however,  but  that  they 
have  time  for  the  politesse  of  tossing  up 
shields  and  spears  with  a  loud  shout  of 
"  Inkosi !"  which  salutation  the  baby,  who 
takes  it  entirely  to  himself,  returns  with 
great  gravity  and  unction.  These  are 
the  vanguard,  the  flower  of  Kafir  chiv- 
alry, who  are  escorting  the  daughter  of 
a  chieftain  to  her  new  home  in  a  kraal 
on  the  opposite  range  of  hills.  They 
make  it  a  point  of  honor  to  go  as  quick- 
ly as  possible,  for  they  are  like  the  stroke 
oar  and  give  the  time  to  the  others.  After 
them  come  the  male  relatives  of  the  bride, 
a  motley  crew,  numerous,  but  altogether 
wanting  in  the  style  and  bearing  of  the 
warriors.  Their  garb,  too,  is  a  wretched 
mixture,  and  a  compromise  between 
clothes  and  no  clothes,  and  they  shuf- 
fle breathlessly  along,  some  with  sacks 
over  their  shoulders,  some  with  old  tu- 
nics of  red  or  blue  and  nothing  else,  and 
some  only  with  two  flaps  or  aprons.  But 
all  wear  snuffboxes  in  their  ears — snuff- 
boxes made  of  every  conceivable  mate- 
rial—  hollow  reeds,  cowries,  tiger-cats' 
teeth,  old  cartridge-cases,  acorn-shells, 
empty  chrysalises  of  some  large  moth 
—  all  sorts  of  miscellaneous  rubbish 
which  could  by  any  means  be  turned  to 
this  use.  Then  comes  a  more  compact 
and  respectable -looking  body  of  men, 
all  with  rings  on  their  heads,  the  Kafir 
sign  and  token  of  well-to-do-ness,  with 
bare  legs,  but  draped  in  bright-colored 


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LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


rugs  or  blankets.  They  too  fling  up 
their  right  arm  and  cry  "Inkosi!"  as 
they  race  along,  but  are  more  intent  on 
urging  on  their  charge,  the  bride,  who  is 
in  their  midst.  Poor  girl !  she  has  some 
five  or  six  miles  yet  to  go,  and  she  looks 
ready  to  drop  now ;  but  there  seems  to 
be  no  consideration  for  her  fatigue,  and 
I  observe  that  she  evidently  shrinks  from 
the  sticks  which  her  escort  flourish  about. 
She  is  a  good-looking,  tall  girl,  with  a  nice 
expression  in  spite  of  her  jaded  and  hur- 
ried air.  She  wears  only  a  large  sheet  of 
coarse  brownish  cloth  draped  gracefully 
and  decently  around  her,  leaving,  how- 
ever, her  straight,  shapely  legs  bare  to 
run.  On  her  right  arm  she  too  bears  a 
pretty  little  shield  made  of  dun  and 
white  ox  hide,  and  her  face  is  smeared 
over  brow  and  cheeks  with  red  clay, 
her  hair  also  being  tinged  with  it.  She 
glances  wistfully,  I  fancy,  at  Maria  stand- 
ing near  me  in  her  good  clothes  and  with 
her  fat,  comfortable  look.  Kafir  girls 
dread  being  married,  for  it  is  simply 
taking  a  hard  place  without  wages.  Love 
has  very  rarely  anything  to  do  with  the 
union,  and  yet  the  only  cases  of  murder 
of  which  I  have  heard  have  been  com- 
mitted under  the  influence  of  either  love 
or  jealousy.  This  has  always  seemed 
odd  to  me,  as  a  Kafir  girl  does  not  appear 
at  all  prone  to  one  or  the  other.  When 
I  say  to  Maria,  "Perhaps  you  will  want 
to  marry  some  day,  Maria,  and  leave 
me?"  she  shakes  her  head  vehemently, 
and  says,  "  No,  no,  I  should  not  like  to 
do  that :  I  should  have  to  work  much 
harder,  and  no  one  would  be  kind  to 
me."  Maria  too  looks  compassionately 
at  her  savage  sister  racing  along,  and 
murmurs,  "  Maria  would  not  like  to  have 
to  run  so  fast  as  that."  Certainly,  she  is 
not  in  good  condition  for  a  hand  gallop 
across  these  hills,  for  she  is  bursting  out 
of  all  her  gowns,  although  she  is  grow- 
ing very  tall  as  well. 

There  is  no  other  woman  in  the  bridal 
cavalcade,  which  is  a  numerous  one,  and 
closes  with  a  perfect  mob  of  youths  and 
boys  grunting  and  shuffling  along.  Ma- 
ria says  doubtfully,  "I  think  they  are 
only  taking  that  girl  to  look  at  her  kraal. 
She  won't  be  married  just  yet,  for  they 


say  the  heer  is  not  ready  so  soon."  This 
information  is  shouted  out  as  some  of 
the  party  rush  past  us,  but  I  cannot 
catch  the  exact  words  amid  the  loud  mo- 
notonous song  with  a  sort  of  chorus  or 
accompaniment  of  grunts. 

Ever  since  my  arrival  I  have  wanted  to 
see  a  real  Kafir  kraal,  but  the  difficulty 
has  been  to  find  one  of  any  size  and  re- 
taining any  of  the  distinctive  features  of 
such  places.  There  are  numbers  of  *hem 
all  about  the  hills  which  surround  Maritz- 
burg,  but  they  are  poor  degenerate  things, 
the  homes  of  the  lowest  class  of  Kafir,  a 
savage  in  his  most  disgusting  and  dan- 
gerous state  of  transition,  when  he  is 
neither  one  thing  nor  the  other,  and  has 
picked  up  only  the  vices  of  civilization. 
Such  kraals  would  be  unfavorable  spe- 
cimens of  a  true  Kafir  village,  and  only 
consist  of  half  a  dozen  ruinous,  filthy 
hovels  whose  inhabitants  would  probably 
beg  of  you.  For  some  time  past  I  had 
been  inquiring  diligently  where  a  really 
respectable  kraal  could  be  found,  and  at 
last  I  heard  of  one  about  eight  miles  off, 
whose  "induna"  or  head-man  gave  it  a 
very  good  character.  Accordingly,  we 
set  out  on  a  broiling  afternoon,  so  early 
in  the  day  that  the  sun  was  still  beating 
down  on  us  with  all  his  summer  tricks 
of  glowing  heat  and  a  fierce  fire  of  bright- 
est rays.  The  road  was  steep  over  hill 
and  dale,  and  it  was  only  when  we  had 
climbed  to  the  top  of  each  successive  ridge 
that  a  breath  of  cool  breeze  greeted  us. 
A  strange  and  characteristic  panorama 
gradually  spread  itself  out  before  and 
behind  us.  After  the  first  steep  ascent 
we  lost  sight  of  Maritzburg  and  its  bosky 
streets.  From  the  next  ridge  we  could 
well  see  the  regular  ring  of  wooded 
homesteads  which  lie  in  a  wide  circle 
outside  the  primitive  little  town.  Each 
rising  down  had  a  couple  or  so  of  these 
suburban  villas  hid  away  in  gum  trees 
clinging  to  its  swelling  sides.  Melan- 
choly-looking sides  they  were  now,  and 
dreary  was  the  immediate  country  around 
us,  for  grass-fires  had  swept  the  hills  for 
a  hundred  miles  and  more,  and  far  as 
the  eye  could  reach  all  was  black,  sere 
and  arid,  the  wagon-tracks  alone  winding 
about  in  dusty  distinctness.  The  streams 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


I05 


had  shrunk  away  to  nothing,  and  scarce- 
ly showed  between  their  high  banks.  It 
was  a  positive  relief  to  horse  and  rider 
when  we  had  clambered  up  the  rocky 
track  across  the  highest  saddle  we  had 
yet  needed  to  mount.  Close  on  our  left 
rose,  some  three  hundred  feet  straight  up 
against  the  brass-bright  sky,  a  big  bluff 
with  its  basalt  sides  cut  down  clean  and 
sharp  as  though  by  a  giant's  knife.  In 
its  cold  shade  a  few  stunted  bushes  were 
feebly  struggling  to  keep  their  scraggy 
leaves  and  branches  together,  and  on 
the  right  the  ground  fell  irregularly  away 
down  to  a  valley  in  which  were  lovely 
patches  of  young  forage,  making  a  ten- 
der green  oasis,  precious  beyond  words 
in  contrast  with  the  black  and  sun-dried 
desolation  of  the  hills  around.  Here  too 
were  the  inevitable  gum  trees,  not  to  be 
despised  at  this  ugly  time  of  year,  al- 
though they  are  for  all  the  world  like 
those  stiff  wooden  trees,  all  of  one  pat- 
tern, peculiar  to  the  model  villages  in  the 
toys  of  our  youth.  With  quite  as  little 
grace  and  beauty  do  these  gum  trees 
grow,  but  yet  they  are  the  most  valuable 
things  we  possess,  being  excellent  nat- 
ural drainers  of  marshy  soil,  kindly  ab- 
sorbers of  every  stray  noxious  vapor,  and 
good  amateur  lightning-conductors  into 
the  bargain.  Amid  these  much-abused, 
not-to-be-done-without  trees,  then,  agable 
peeped  :  it  was  evidently  a  thriving,  com- 
fortable homestead,  yet  here  my  friendly 
guide  and  companion  drew  rein  and  look- 
ed around  with  deep  perplexity  on  his 
kindly  face. 

"  How  beautiful  the  view  is  !"  I  cried 
in  delight,  for  indeed  the  distant  sweep 
of  ever-rising  mountains,  the  splendid 
shadows  lying  broad  and  deep  over  the 
hills  and  valleys,  the  great  Umgeni,  dis- 
daining even  this  long  drought,  and  shin- 
ing here  and  there  like  a  silver  ribbon, 
now  widening  into  a  mere,  now  making 
almost  an  island  of  some  vast  tract  of 
country,  but  always  journeying  "with  a 
gentle  ecstasy,"  were  all  most  beautiful. 
The  burnt-up  patches  gave  only  a  brown 
umber  depth  to  the  hollows  in  the  island 
hills,  and  the  rich  red  soil  glowed  bright- 
ly on  the  bare  downs  around  us  as  the 
westering  sun  touched  and  warmed  them 


into  life  and  color.  I  was  well  content 
to  drop  the  reins  on  my  old  horse's  neck 
whilst  I  gazed  with  greedy  eyes  on  the 
fair  scene,  which  I  felt  would  change  and 
darken  in  a  very  short  while.  Perhaps 
it  was  also  this  thought  which  made  my 
companion  say  anxiously,  "  Yes,  but  look 
how  fast  the  sun  is  dropping  behind  that 
high  hill ;  and  where  is  the  kraal  ?  It 
ought  to  be  exactly  here,  according  to 
Mazimbulu's  directions,  and  yet  I  don't 
see  a  sign  of  it,  do  you  ?" 

If  his  eyes,  accustomed  since  child- 
hood to  every  nook  and  cranny  in  these 
hills,  could  not  make  out  where  the  kraal 
hid,  little  chance  was  there  of  mine  find- 
ing it  out.  But  even  he  was  completely 
at  fault,  and  looked  anxiously  arouncj 
like  a  deer-hound  which  has  lost  the 
scent.  The  narrow  track  before  us  led 
straight  on  into  the  interior  for  a  couple 
of  hundred  miles,  and  in  all  the  pano- 
rama at  our  feet  we  could  not  see  trace 
or  sign  of  living  creature,  nor  could  the 
deadliest  silence  bring  sound  of  voice  or 
life  to  our  strained  ears. 

"  I  dare  not  take  you  any  farther,"  Mr. 

Y said :  "it  is  getting  much  too  late 

already.  But  how  provoking  to  come  all 
this  way  and  have  to  go  back  without 
finding  the  kraal !"  In  vain  I  tried  to 
comfort  him  by  assurances  of  how  pleas- 
ant the  ride  had  been,  beguiled  by  many 
a  hunting-story  of  days  when  lions  and 
elephants  drank  at  the  stream  before  us, 
and  when  no  man's  hand  ever  lost  its 
clasp  of  his  g\m,  sleeping  or  waking.  We 
had  come  to  see  a  kraal,  and  it  was  an 
expedition  manque  if  we  could  not  find 
it.  Still,  the  sun  seemed  in  a  tremendous 
hurry  to  reach  the  shelter  of  that  high 
hill  yonder,  and  even  I  was  constrained 
to  acknowledge  we  must  not  go  farther 
along  the  rocky  track  before  us.  At  this 
moment  of  despair  there  came  swiftly 
and  silently  round  the  sharp  edge  of  the 
bluff  just  ahead  of  us  two  Kafir-women, 
with  huge  bundles  of  firewood  on  their 
heads,  and  walking  rapidly  along,  as 
though  in  a  hurry  to  get  home.  To  my 
companion  Kafir  was  as  familiar  as  Eng- 
lish, so  he  was  at  no  loss  for  pleasant  words 
and  still  more  pleasant  smiles  with  which 
to  ask  the  wav  to  Mazimbuln's  kraal. 


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LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


"  We  go  there  now,  O  great  chieftain  !" 
the  women  answered  with  one  voice ;  and, 
true  to  the  savage  code  of  politeness,  they 
betrayed  no  surprise  as  to  what  we  could 
possibly  want  at  their  kraal  so  late.  We 
had  scarcely  noticed  a  faint  narrow  track 
on  the  burnt-up  ground  to  our  right,  but 
into  this  the  women  unhesitatingly  struck, 
and  we  followed  them  as  best  we  could. 
Scarcely  three  hundred  yards  away  from 
the  main  track,  round  the  shoulder  of  a 
down,  and  nestling  close  in  a  sort  of  nat- 
ural basin  scooped  out  of  the  hillside,  was 
the  kraal,  silent  enough  now,  for  all  except 
a  few  old  men  and  babies  were  absent. 
The  women,  like  our  guides,  were  out 
collecting  firewood ;  some  of  the  young- 
er men  and  bigger  children  had  gone 
into  town  to  sell  poultry  and  eggs  ;  others 
were  still  at  work  for  the  farmer  whose 
homestead  stood  a  mile  or  two  away. 
There  must  have  been  at  least  a  hundred 
goats  skipping  about  beneath  the  steep 
hillside  down  which  we  had  just  come — 
goats  who  had  ventured  to  the  very  edge 
of  the  shelf  along  which  our  bridle-path 
had  lain,  and  yet  who  had  never  by  bleat 
or  inquisitive  protruded  head  betrayed 
their  presence  to  us.  In  the  centre  of 
the  excavation  stood  a  large,  high,  neat- 
ly-wattled fence,  forming  an  enclosure 
for  the  cattle  at  night,  a  remnant  of  the 
custom  when  Kafir  herds  were  ravaged 
by  wild  animals  and  still  wilder  neigh- 
bors. A  very  small  angle  of  this  place 
was  portioned  off  as  a  sty  for  the  biggest 
and  mangiest  pig  it  has  ever  been  my 
lot  to  behold — a  gaunt  and  hideous  beast, 
yet  the  show  animal  of  the  kraal,  and 
the  first  object  which  Mazimbulu  pointed 
out  to  us.  Of  course,  Mazimbulu  was  at 
home :  what  is  the  use  of  being  an  in- 
duna  if  you  have  to  exert  yourself?  He 
came  forward  at  once  to  receive  us,  and 
did  the  honors  of  his  kraal  most  thor- 
oughly and  with  much  grace  and  dignity. 

Mr.  Y explained  that  I  was  the  wife 

of  another  inkosi,  and  that  I  was  con- 
sumed by  a  desire  to  see  with  my  own 
eyes  a  real  Kafir  kraal.  It  is  needless 
to  say  that  this  was  pleasantly  conveyed, 
and  a  compliment  to  this  particular  kraal 
neatly  introduced  here. 

Mazimbulu  —  an  immensely  tall,  pow- 


erful elderly  man,  "ringed"  of  course, 
and  draped  in  a  large  gay  blanket — 
looked  at  me  with  half-  contemptuous 
surprise,  but  saluted  to  carry  off  his 
wonder,  and  said  deprecatingly  to  Mr. 
Y :  "O  chief,  the  chieftainess  is  wel- 
come; but  what  a  strange  people  are 
these  whites !  They  have  all  they  can 
desire,  all  that  is  good  and  beautiful  of 
their  own,  yet  they  can  find  pleasure  in 
looking  at  where  we  live  !  Why,  chief, 
you  know  their  horses  and  dogs  have 
better  places  to  sleep  in  than  we  h^ve. 
It  is  all  most  wonderful,  but  the  chief- 
tainess may  be  sure  we  are  glad  to  see 
her,  no  matter  for  what  reason  she 
comes." 

There  was  not  very  much  to  see,  af- 
ter all.  About  twenty  large,  substan- 
tial, comfortable  huts,  all  of  the  beehive 
shape,  stood  in  a  crescent,  the  largest  in 
the  middle.  This  belonged  to  Mazim- 
bulu, and  in  front  of  it  knelt  his  newest 
wife,  resting  on  her  heels  and  cutting  up 
pumpkins  into  little  bits  to  make  a  sort 
of  soup,  or  what  she  called  "scoff."  I 
think  young  Mrs.  Mazimbulu  was  one 
of  the  handsomest  and  sulkiest  Kafir- 
women  I  have  yet  seen.  She  was  very 
smart  in  beads  and  bangles,  her  coiffure 
was  elaborate  and  carefully  stained  red, 
her  blanket  and  petticoat  were  gay  and 
warm  and  new,  and  yet  she  looked  the 
very  picture  of  ill-humor.  The  vicious 
way  she  cut  up  her  pumpkins  and  pitch- 
ed the  slices  into  a  large  pot,  the  sar- 
castic glances  she  cast  at  Mazimbulu  as 
he  invited  me  to  enter  his  hut,  declaring 
that  he  was  so  fortunate  in  the  matter  of 
wives  that  I  should  find  it  the  pink  of 
cleanliness !  Nothing  pleased  her,  and 
she  refused  to  talk  to  me  or  to  "saka 
bono,"  or  anything.  I  never  saw  such 
a  shrew,  and  wondered  whether  poor 
Mazimbulu  had  not  indeed  got  a  hand- 
ful in  this  his  latest  purchase.  And  yet 
he  looked  quite  capable  of  taking  care 
of  himself,  and  his  hand  had  probably 
lost  none  of  its  old  cunning  in  boxing  a 
refractory  bride's  ears,  for  the  damsel  in 
question  seemed  rather  on  the  watch  as 
to  how  far  she  might  venture  to  show  her 
temper.  Such  a  contrast  as  her  healthy, 
vigorous  form  made  to  that  of  a  slight, 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


107 


sickly  girl  who  crawled  out  of  an  adjoin- 
ing hut  to  see  the  wonderful  spectacle 
of  an  "inkosa-casa"  !  This  poor  thing 
was  a  martyr  to  sciatica,  and  indeed  had 
rheumatism  apparently  in  all  her  joints. 
She  moved  aside  her  kilt  of  lynx  skins 
to  show  me  a  terribly  swollen  knee, 
saying  plaintively  in  Kafir,  "  I  ache  all 
over,  for  always."  Mazimbulu  declared 
in  answer  to  my  earnest  inquiries  that 
they  were  all  very  kind  to  her,  and  prom- 
ised faithfully  that  a  shilling  which  I  put 
in  her  hand  should  remain  her  own  prop- 
erty. "  Physic  or  beads,  just  as  she  likes," 
he  vowed,  but  seemed  well  content  when 
I  gave  another  coin  into  his  own  hand 
for  snuff.  There  were  not  many  babies 
— only  three  or  four  miserable  sickly  crea- 
tures, all  over  sores  and  dirt  and  ophthal- 
mia. Yet  the  youth  who  held  our  horses 

whilst  we  walked  about  and  Mr.  Y 

chatted  fluently  with  Mazimbulu  might 
have  stood  for  the  model  of  a  bronze 
Apollo,  so  straight  and  tall  and  sym- 
metrical were  his  shapely  limbs  and  his 
lithe,  active  young  body.  He  too  shout- 
ed "  Inkosa-casa !"  in  rapturous  gratitude 
for  a  sixpence  which  I  gave  him,  and  vow- 
ed to  bring  me  fowls  to  buy  whenever  the 
young  chickens  all  around  should  be  big 
enough. 

My  commissariat  is  always  on  my 
mind,  and  I  never  lose  an  opportunity 
of  replenishing  it,  but  I  must  confess 
that  I  get  horribly  cheated  whenever  I 
try  bargaining  on  my  own  account.  For 
instance,  I  sent  out  a  roving  commission 
the  other  day  for  honey,  which  resulted 
in  the  offer  of  a  small  jar  containing  per- 
haps one  pound  of  empty,  black  and 
dirty  comb  and  a  tablespoonful  of  honey, 
which  apparently  had  already  been  used 
to  catch  flies.  For  this  treasure  eight 
shillings  were  asked.  To-day  I  tried  to 
buy  a  goat  from  Mazimbulu,  but  he  hon- 
estly said  it  would  be  of  no  use  to  me, 
nor  could  I  extract  a  promise  of  milk 
from  the  cows  I  saw  coming  home  just 
then.  He  declared  that  there  was  no 
milk  to  be  had  ;  and  certainly,  when 
one  looks  at  the  surrounding  pasture, 
it  is  not  incredible. 

Mazimbulu's  own  hut  contained  little 
beyond  a  stool  or  two,  some  skins  and 


mats  for  a  bed,  a  heap  of  mealie-husks 
with  which  to  replenish  the  fire,  his  shield 
and  a  bundle  of  assegais  and  knobkerries. 
There  was  another  smaller  wattled  en- 
closure holding  a  great  store  of  mealies, 
and  another  piled  up  with  splendid  pump- 
kins. At  the  exact  top  of  Mazimbulu's  hut 
stood  a  perfect  curiosity-shop  of  lightning- 
charms —  old  spear -points,  shells,  the 
broken  handle  of  a  china  jug,  and  a 
painted  portion  of  some  child's  toy :  all 
that  is  mysterious  or  unknown  to  them 
must  perforce  be  a  lightning  -  charm. 
They  would  no  more  use  a  conductor 
than  they  would  fly,  declaring  triumph- 
antly that  our  houses,  for  all  their  "fire- 
wires,"  get  more  often  struck  by  light- 
ning than  their  huts.  Indeed,  Mazim- 
bulu became  quite  pathetic  on  the  sub- 
ject of  the  personal  risk  I  was  running  on 
account  of  my  prejudice  against  his  light- 
ning-charms, and  hinted  that  I  should 
come  to  a  bad  end  some  day  through 
it. 

By  the  time  we  had  spent  half  an  hour 
in  the  kraal  the  sun  had  long  since  gain- 
ed the  shelter  of  the  western  hills  and 
sunk  behind  them,  taking  with  him  ap- 
parently every  vestige  of  daylight  out 
of  the  sky.  No  one  who  has  not  felt  it 
could  believe  the  rapidity  of  the  change 
in  the  temperature.  So  long  as  there  was 
sunlight  it  was  too  hot.  In  half  an  hour 
it  was  bitingly,  bitterly  cold.  We  could 
not  go  fast  down  the  rocky  tracks,  but 
we  cantered  over  every  inch  of  available 
space — cantered  for  the  sake  of  warming 
ourselves  as  much  as  to  get  home.  The 
young  moon  gave  us  light  enough  to 
keep  on  the  right  track,  but  I  don't  think 
I  ever  was  so  cold  in  my  life  as  when  we 
reached  home  about  half-past  six.  The 
wood-fire  in  the  little  drawing-room — the 
only  room  with  a  fireplace — seemed  in- 
deed delicious,  and  so  did  a  cup  of  tea 

so  hot  as  to  be  almost  scalding.     F 

declared  that  I  was  of  a  bright-blue  col- 
or, and  I  admit  that  I  came  nearer  to  un- 
derstanding what  being  frozen  to  death 
meant  than  I  had  ever  done  before. 
Yet  there  was  not  much  frost,  but  one 
suffered  from  the  reaction  after  the  burn- 
ing heat  of  the  day  and  from  the  impos- 
sibility of  taking  any  wraps  with  one. 


io8 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


JULY  12. 

Don't  think  I  am  going  to  let  you  off 
from  my  usual  monthly  grumble  about 
the  weather.  Not  a  bit  of  it !  It  is  worse 
than  ever.  At  this  moment  a  violent  and 
bitterly  cold  gale  of  wind  is  blowing,  and 
I  hear  the  red  tiles  flying  off  the  house, 
which  I  fully  expect  will  be  a  regular 
sieve  by  the  time  the  rains  come.  Not 
one  drop  of  rain  have  we  had  these  six 
weeks,  and  people  remark  that  "the  dry 
season  is  beginning"  Everything  smells 
and  tastes  of  dust — one's  clothes,  the  fur- 
niture, everything.  If  I  sit  down  in  an 
arm-chair,  I  disturb  a  cloud  of  dust ;  my 
pillow  is,  I  am  convinced,  stuffed  with  it; 
my  writing-table  is  inches  deep  in  it.  All 
the  food  is  flavored  with  it,  and  Don  Quix- 
ote's enemies  could  not  more  persistently 
"bite  the  dust"  than  we  do  at  each  meal. 
Yet  when  I  venture  to  mention  this  draw- 
back in  answer  to  the  usual  question,  "Is 
not  this  delicious  weather  ?"  the  answer  is 
always,  "  Oh,  but  you  can  have  no  dust 
here :  you  should  see  what  it  is  in  town !" 
Between  us  and  the  town  is  an  ever-fly- 
ing scud  of  dust,  through  which  we  can 
but  ill  discern  the  wagons.  I  wonder 
there  are  no  accidents,  for  one  often 
hears  a  wagon  before  and  behind  one 
when  it  is  impossible  to  see  anything 
through  the  choking,  suffocating  cloud 
around  one.  Of  a  still  day,  when  you  car- 
ry your  own  dust  quietly  along  with  you, 
there  is  nothing  for  it  except  to  stop  at 
home  if  you  wish  to  keep  your  temper. 

The  other  day  little  G was  about  to 

suffer  the  extreme  penalty  of  the  domes- 
tic law  for  flagrant  disobedience,  and  he 
remarked  dryly  to  the  reluctant  execu- 
tioner, "You  had  better  take  care  :  I  am 
very  dusty"  It  was  quite  true,  for  the 
slipper  elicited  such  clouds  of  dust  from 
the  little  blue  serge  suit  that  the  chas- 
tisement had  to  be  curtailed,  much  to 
the  culprit's  satisfaction.  As  for  the 
baby,  he  was  discovered  the  other  day 
taking  a  dust  -  bath  exactly  like  the 
chickens,  and  considered  it  very  hard 
to  be  stopped  in  his  amusement.  Every 
now  and  then  we  have  a  dust-storm: 
there  have  been  two  this  month  already, 
perfect  hurricanes  of  cold  wind  driving 
the  dust  in  solid  sheets  before  them. 


Nearer  the  coast  these  storms  have  been 
followed  by  welcome  rain,  but  here  we 
are  still  dry  and  parched.  The  only 
water-supply  we  (speaking  individually) 
have  is  brought  in  buckets  from  the  river, 
about  half  a  mile  off,  and  one  has  to  wash 
in  it  and  drink  it  with  closed  eyes.  But  it 
cannot  be  unwholesome,  thank  Heaven  ! 
for  most  of  us  take  nothing  else  and  are 
very  well.  I  owe  it  a  grudge,  however, 
on  account  of  its  extraordinary  hardness. 
Not  only  does  it  spoil  the  flavor  of  my  be- 
loved tea,  but  it  chaps  our  skins  fright- 
fully;  and  what  with  the  dust  in  the 
pores,  and  the  chronic  irritation  caused 
by  some  strange  peculiarity  in  the  cli- 
mate, we  are  all  like  nutmeg -graters, 
and  one  can  understand  the  common- 
sense  of  a  Kafir's  toilette,  into  which 
grease  enters  largely.  Yet  in  spite  of 
dust  and  dryness  —  for  everything  is 
ludicrously  dry,  sugar  and  salt  are  so 
many  solid  cakes,  not  to  be  dealt  with 
by  means  of  a  spoon  at  all  —  one  is  very 
thankful  for  the  cold,  bracing  weather, 
and  unless  there  is  a  necessity  for  front- 
ing the  dust,  we  contrive  to  enjoy  many 
of  the  pleasant  sunshiny  hours  in  the  ve- 
randah ;  and  I  rejoice  to  see  the  roses 
blooming  again  in  the  children's  cheeks. 
Every  evening  we  have  a  wood-fire  on 
the  open  hearth  in  the  drawing-room, 
and  there  have  been  sharp  frosts  lately. 
The  waving  tips  of  the  poor  bamboos 
look  sadly  yellow,  but  I  have  two  fine 
flourishing  young  camellias  out  of  doors 
without  shelter  of  any  kind,  and  my  sup- 
ply of  roses  has  never  failed  from  those 
trees  which  get  regularly  watered.  The 
foliage,  too,  of  the  geraniums  is  as  lux- 
uriant as  ever,  though  each  leaf  is  white 
with  dust,  but  the  first  shower  will  make 
them  lovely  once  more. 

Quail  passed  over  here  a  few  days  ago 
in  dense,  solid  clouds,  leaving  many 
weary  stragglers  here  and  there  on  the 
veldt  to  delight  the  sportsmen.  I  am 
told  it  is  a  strange  and  wonderful  sight 
to  see  these  birds  sweep — sometimes  in 
the  dead  silence  of  a  moonlight  night, 
flying  low  and  compactly,  beating  the  air 
with  the  monotonous  whir  of  their  un- 
tiring wings  —  down  one  of  the  wide, 
empty  streets  of  quiet  Maritzburg,  so 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


109 


close  to  the  bystander  that  a  stick  would 
knock  some  over.  And  to  think  of  the 
distance  they  have  traveled  thus  !  For 
hundreds  and  hundreds  of  miles,  over 
deserts  and  lakes  at  whose  existence  we 
can  but  dimly  guess,  the  little  wayfarers 
have  journeyed,  from  the  far  interior 
down  to  the  seaboard  of  this  great  con- 
tinent. Last  season  a  weary  pair  drop- 
ped down  among  my  rose-bushes,  but  no 
sportsman  knew  of  their  visit,  for  I  found 
them  established  there  when  I  came,  and 
jealously  guarded  their  secret  for  them  ; 
but  I  don't  know  yet  whether  any  others 
have  claimed  my  hospitality  and  protec- 
tion, in  the  same  way,  poor  pretty  crea- 
tures ! 

I  was  seized  with  a  sudden  wish  the 
other  day  to  see  the  market  here,  and 
accordingly  got  my  household  up  very 
early  one  of  these  cold  mornings,  hur- 
ried breakfast  over,  and  drove  down  to 
the  market-square  exactly  at  nine  A.  M., 
when  the  sales  commence.  Everything 
is  sold  by  auction,  but  sold  with  a  rapid- 
ity which  seemed  magical  to  me.  I 
saw  some  fine  potatoes  a  dozen  yards 
away  from  where  the  market-master  was 
Celling  with  lightning  speed  wagon-load 
after  wagon-load  of  fresh  green  forage. 
I  certainly  heard  "  Two  and  a  halfpenny, 
two  and  three  farthings  —  thank  you  ! 
gone !"  coming  rather  near,  and  I  had 
gone  so  far  in  my  own  mind  as  to  deter- 
mine which  of  my  friends — for  heaps  of 
people  I  knew  were  there — I  should  ask 
to  manage  it  for  me.  But  like  a  wave 
the  bidding  swept  over  my  potatoes — I 
quite  looked  upon  them  as  mine — and 
they  were  gone.  So,  as  I  did  not  want 
any  firewood,  and  there  were  only  about 
a  dozen  huge  wagons  piled  high  up  with 
lopped  branches  and  limbs  of  trees,  and 
as  I  had  begun  to  perceive  that  a  dozen 
wagon-loads  were  nothing  to  the  rapid 
utterance  of  the  market-master,  I  went 
into  the  market-hall  to  look  at  the  fruit 
and  vegetables,  eggs  and  butter,  with 
which  the  tables  were  fairly  well  cover- 
ed. There  was  very  little  poultry,  and 
a  pair  of  ducks  toward  which  I  felt  some- 
what attracted  went  for  six  shillings  six- 
pence each,  directly  the  bidding  began. 
So  I  consoled  myself  by  purchasing,  still 


in  a  vicarious  manner  by  means  of  a 
friend,  three  turkeys.  Such  a  bargain  ! 
the  only  cheap  things  I  have  seen  in 
Natal.  Only  nine  shillings  ninepence 
apiece! — beautiful  full-grown  turkeys — 
two  hens  and  a  cock,  just  what  I  wanted. 
Of  course,  everybody  clustered  round  me, 
and  began  to  damp  my  joy  directly  by 
pouring  statistics  into  my  ears  of  the 
mortality  among  turkey-chicks  and  the 
certain  ill-fortune  which  would  attend  my 
efforts  to  rear  them.  But  it  is  too  early 
in  the  season  yet  for  such  anxieties,  and 
I  am  free  for  the  next  two  months  to 
admire  my  turkeys  as  much  as  I  choose 
without  breaking  my  heart  over  the  un- 
timely fate  of  their  offspring.  Yes,  these 
turkeys  were  the  only  cheap  things  : 
butter  sold  easily  at  three  shillings  nine- 
pence  a  pound,  eggs  at  three  shillings  a 
dozen,  and  potatoes  and  other  vegetables 
at  pretty  nearly  Covent  Garden  prices. 
It  gave  one  a  good  idea  of  the  chronic 
state  of  famine  even  so  little  a  town  as 
this  lives  in  to  see  the  clean  sweep  made 
of  every  single  thing,  live  and  dead — 
always  excepting  my  turkeys  —  in  ten 
minutes  after  the  market-master  entered 
the  building.  I  am  sure  treble  the  quan- 
tity would  have  been  snapped  up  quite 
as  quickly.  Such  odd  miscellaneous 
things! — bacon,  cheese,  pumpkins,  all 
jumbled  together.  Then  outside  for  a 
few  moments,  to  finish  up  with  a  few 
wheelbarrows  of  green  barley,  a  basket 
or  two  of  mealies,  and  some  fagots  of 
firewood  brought  in  by  the  Kafirs ;  and 
lo!  in  something  less  than  an  hour  it 
was  all  over,  and  hungry  Maritzburg 
had  swallowed  up  all  she  could  get  for 
the  day.  The  market-master  was  now 
at  liberty  —  after  explaining  to  a  Kafir 
or  two  that  it  was  not,  strictly  speaking, 
right  to  sell  your  wheelbarrow-load  twice 
over,  once  privately  and  once  publicly — 
to  show  me  the  market-hall,  a  very  cred- 
itable building,  large  and  commodious, 
well  roofed  and  lighted.  Knowing  as  I 
did  the  exceeding  slowness  of  build- 
ing operations  in  Maritzburg,  it  struck 
me  as  little  less  than  marvelous  to  hear 
that  it  had  actually  been  run  up  in  twen- 
ty-one days.  No  lesser  pressure  than 
Prince  Alfred's  visit  about  fifteen  years 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


ago  could  have  induced  such  Aladdin- 
like  rapidity ;  but  the  loyal  Maritzburg- 
ers  wanted  to  give  their  sailor-prince  a 
ball,  and  there  was  no  room  in  the  whole 
town  capable  of  holding  one-quarter  of 
the  people  who  wanted  to  see  the  royal 
midshipman.  So  Kafirs  and  whites  and 
men  of  all  colors  fell  to  with  a  will,  and 
hammered  night  and  day  until  all  was 
finished,  extempore  chandeliers  of  paint- 
ed hoops  dangling  in  all  directions,  flow- 
ers and  flags  hiding  the  rough-and-ready 
walls,  and  the  "  lion  and  the  unicorn  fight- 
ing for  the  crown  "  in  orthodox  fashion 
over  the  doorway,  where  they  remain  to 
this  day.  The  only  thing  that  puzzles  me 
is  whether  the  floor  was  at  all  more  even 
then  than  now,  for  at  present  it  is  near- 
ly as  much  up  and  down  as  the  waves 
of  the  Indian  Ocean. 

Now,  too,  that  there  were  no  more 
domestic  purchases  to  be  made,  I  could 
look  about  and  see  how  quaint  and  pic- 
turesque it  all  was.  In  summer  the  effect 
must  really  be  charming  with  the  double 
bordering  of  acacia  trees  fresh  and  green 
instead  of  leafless  and  dusty ;  the  queer 
little  Dutch  church,  with  its  hugely  dis- 
proportionate weathercock  shining  large 
and  bright  in  the  streaming  sunlight ;  the 
teams  of  patient  bullocks  moving  slowly 
off  again  through  the  dust  with  wagons 
of  forage  or  firewood  to  be  dragged  to 
their  various  destinations  ;  and  the  fast- 
melting,  heterogeneous  crowd  of  Kafirs 
and  coolies,  Dutch  and  English  —  some 
with  baskets,  some  with  dangling  poultry 
or  carefully-carried  tins  of  eggs,  but  none 
with  turkeys.  The  market-hall  and  its 
immediate  vicinity  became  quite  desert- 
ed, but  the  crowd  seemed  reassembling  a 
little  lower  down,  where  a  weekly  auction 
was  being  held  in  a  primitive  fashion  out 
in  the  open  air  beneath  the  acacia  trees. 
A  stalwart  Kafir  wandered  about  listless- 
ly ringing  a  large  bell,  and  the  auction- 
eer, mounted  on  a  table,  was  effecting 
what  he  called  a  clearance  sale,  appar- 
ently of  all  the  old  rubbish  in  the  place. 
Condemned  military  stores,  such  as  tents 
and  greatcoats,  pianos  from  which  the 
very  ghost  of  tone  had  fled  years  ago, 
cracked  china,  broken  chairs,  crinolines, 
fiddles,  kettles,  faded  pictures  under  fly- 


blown glasses,  empty  bottles,  old  baskets, 
— all  were  "going,  going,  gone"  whilst 
we  stood  there,  drifting  away  to  other 
homes  all  over  the  place.  I  pass  every 
day  an  ingenious  though  lowly  family 
mansion  made  solely  and  entirely  of  the 
sheets  of  zinc  out  of  boxes,  fastened  to- 
gether in  some  strange  fashion :  roof, 
walls,  flooring,  all  are  of  it.  There  is 
neither  door  nor  window  facing  the  road, 
so  I  don't  know  how  they  are  put  in,  but 
I  can  imagine  how  that  hovel  must  creak 
in  a  high  wind.  What  mysterious  law 
of  gravitation  keeps  it  down  to  the  ground 
I  have  failed  to  discover,  nor  do  I  know 
how  the  walls  are  supported  even  in  their 
leaning  position.  Well,  I  saw  the  owner 
of  this  cot,  a  Dutchman,  buying  furni- 
ture, and  he  was  very  near  purchasing 
the  piano  under  the  impression  it  was  a 
folding-up  bedstead.  I  have  always  taken 
such  an  interest  in  the  zinc  dwelling  that 
it  was  with  difficulty  I  could  refrain  from 
giving  my  opinion  about  its  furniture. 

But  the  sun  is  getting  high,  and  it  is 
ten  o'clock  and  past — quite  time  for  all 
housewives  to  be  at  home  and  the  men 
at  their  business ;  so  the  clearance  sale 
ends  like  a  transformation-scene.  Kafirs 
hoist  ponderous  burdens  on  their  heads 
and  walk  off  unconcernedly  with  them, 
and  the  odds  and  ends  of  what  were 
once  household  goods  disappear  round 
the  corner.  My  early  rising  makes  me 
feel  as  dissipated  as  one  does  after  going 
to  a  wedding,  and  I  can't  help  a  reluctance 

to  go  back  to  the  daily  routine  of  G 's 

lessons  and  baby's  pinafores,  it  seems  so 
delightful  to  idle  about  in  the  sunshine  in 
spite  of  the  dust.  What  is  there  to  do  or 
to  see  ?  What  excuse  can  any  one  find 
at  a  moment's  notice  to  prevent  my  going 
home  just  yet  ?  It  is  an  anxious  thought, 
for  there  is  nothing  to  do,  and  nothing  to 
see  beyond  wagons  and  oxen,  in  the  length 
and  breadth  of  Maritzburg..  Some  one 
fortunately  recollects  the  mill — there  is 
only  one  in  the  whole  place — and  avers 
that  wool-scouring  is  going  on  there  at 
the  present  time.  At  all  events,  it  is  a 
charming  drive,  and  in  five  minutes  we 
are  trotting  along,  raising  a  fine  cloud  of 
dust  on  the  road  which  leads  to  the  park. 
When  the  river-side  has  been  reached — 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


Ill 


poor,  shrunken  Umsindusi !  it  is  a  mere 
rivulet  now,  and  thoroughly  shrunken 
and  depressed — we  turn  off  and  follow 
the  windings  of  the  banks  for  a  few  hun- 
dred yards  till  we  come  to  where  the  mill- 
wheel  catches  and  makes  use  of  a  tiny 
streamlet  just  as  it  is  entering  the  river. 
It  is  a  very  picturesque  spot,  although  the 
immediate  country  around  is  flat  and  un- 
interesting ;  but  there  is  such  a  profusion 
of  willow  trees,  such  beautiful  tufts  of 
tall  willow-ferns,  such  clumps  of  grasses, 
that  the  old  brick  buildings  are  hidden 
and  shaded  by  all  manner  of  waving 
branches.  Then  in  front  is  the  inevit- 
able wagon,  the  long,  straggling  span  of 
meagre  oxen  with  their  tiny  black  fore- 
looper  and  attendant  Kafirs.  This  is  in- 
deed beginning  at  the  end  of  the  story, 
for  into  the  wagon  big  neat  bales  all 
ready  for  shipment — bales  which  have 
been  "dumped"  and  branded — are  be- 
ing lowered  by  a  crane  out  of  a  large 
upper  story.  Very  different  do  these 
bales  look  as  they  now  depart  from  those 
in  which  the  wool  arrives.  With  the 
characteristic  untidiness  and  makeshift 
fashion  of  the  whole  country,  the  wool 
is  loosely  and  carelessly  stuffed  into  in- 
ferior bales,  which  become  ragged  and 
filthy  by  the  time  they  reach  this,  and 
are  a  discredit  to  the  place  as  they  pass 
along  the  streets.  That  is  the  state  in 
which  it  is  brought  here  and  delivered 
over  to  the  care  of  the  wool  -  scourers. 
The  first  step  is  to  sort  it  all,  sift  the 
coarsest  dirt  out  of  it,  and  then  away  it 
goes,  first  into  a  bath  of  soda  and  water, 
and  afterward  into  many  succeeding 
tubs  of  cooler  water,  until  at  last  it 
emerges,  dripping  indeed,  but  cleansed 
from  burrs  and  seeds,  and  white  as  the 
driven  snow,  to  be  next  laid  out  on  a 
terrace  sheltered  from  dust  and  wind 
and  dried  rapidly  under  the  burning 
South  African  sun.  Then  there  is  the 
steam -press,  which  squeezes  it  tightly 
into  these  neat,  trim  bales,  and  a  hy- 
draulic machine  which  gives  it  that  one 
turn  more  of  the  screw  which  is  sup- 
posed to  constitute  the  difference  be- 
tween neuralgia  and  gout,  but  which  here 
marks  the  difference  between  "  dumped  " 
and  "  undumped  "  bales.  The  iron  bands 


are  riveted  with  a  resounding  clang  or 
two,  the  letters  are  rapidly  brushed  in 
over  their  iron  plate,  and  the  bale  is 
pronounced  finished.  A  very  creditable 
piece  of  work  it  is,  too — neat  and  tidy  out- 
side and  fair  and  honest  inside.  I  heard 
none  of  the  usual  excuses  for  dirt  and 
untidiness — no  "Oh,  one  cannot  get  the 
Kafirs  to  do  anything."  There  was  a 
sufficiency  of  Kafirs  at  work  under  the 
eyes  of  the  masters,  but  there  was  no 
ill-temper  or  rough  language.  All  was 
methodical  and  business-like,  every  de- 
tail seen  to  and  carried  thoroughly  out 
from  first  to  last,  and  the  result  some- 
thing to  be  proud  of.  The  machinery 
combed  and  raked  and  dipped  with  mo- 
notonous patience,  and  many  an  inge- 
nious connecting-rod  or  band  saved  time 
and  labor.  I  declare  it  was  the  most  en- 
couraging and  satisfactory  thing  I  have 
seen  since  I  came,  apart  from  the  real 
pleasure  of  looking  at  a  bale  of  wool 
turned  out  as  it  used  to  be  from  every 
wool-shed  in  New  Zealand,  instead  of 
the  untidy  bundles  one  sees  slowly  trav- 
eling down  to  Durham,  not  even  well 
packed  in  the  wagons.  Apart  from  this, 
it  is  inspiriting  to  see  the  resources  of 
the  place  made  the  best  of,  and  every- 
thing kept  up  to  the  mark  of  a  high 
standard  of  excellence.  There  were  no 
incomplete  or  makeshift  contrivances, 
and  the  two  bright,  active  young  mas- 
ters going  about  and  seeing  to  every- 
thing themselves,  as  colonists  ought  to 
do,  were  each  a  contrast  to  the  ordinary 
loafing,  pale-faced,  unkempt  overseer  of 
half  a  dozen  creeping  Kafirs  that  repre- 
sent the  labor-market  here. 

I  feel,  however,  as  if  I  were  rather 
"loafing"  myself,  and  am  certainly  very 

idle,  for  it  is  past  midday  before  G 

has  half  enough  examined  the  establish- 
ment and  tumbled  often  enough  in  and 
out  of  the  wool- press ;  so  we  leave  the 
cool  shade  of  the  willows  and  the  mes- 
meric throb  of  the  mill-wheel,  and  drive 
home  through  the  dust  once  more  to  our 
own  little  house  on  the  hill. 

Ever  since  I  began  this  letter  I  have 
been  wanting  to  tell  you  of  an  absurd 
visitor  I  had  the  other  day,  and  my  poor 
little  story  has  very  nearly  been  crowded 


112 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


out  by  other  things.  A  couple  of  morn- 
ings ago  I  was  very  busy  making  a  new 
cotton  skirt  for  "Malia" — for  I  am  her 
sole  dressmaker,  and  she  keeps  me  at 
work  always,  what  with  growing  into  a 
stout  grenadier  of  a  girl,  and  what  with 
rending  these  skirts  upon  all  occasions. 
Well,  I  was  getting  over  the  seams  at  a 
fine  rate  on  the  sewing-machine,  which 
I  had  moved  out  into  the  verandah  for 
light  and  warmth,  when  I  became  aware 
of  a  shadow  between  me  and  the  sun. 
It  was  a  very  little  shadow,  and  the  sub- 
stance of  it  was  the  tiniest  old  Dutchman 
you  ever  saw  in  your  life.  I  assure  you 
my  first  idea  was  that  I  must  be  looking 
at  a  little  goblin,  he  w-as  so  precisely  like 
the  pictures  one  sees  in  the  illustrations 
of  a  fairy-tale.  His  long  waistcoat  of  a 
gay-flowered  chintz,  his  odd,  square-tail- 
ed coat  and  square  shoes,  his  wide,  short 
breeches  and  pointed  hat  were  all  in  keep- 
ing with  the  goblin  theory.  But  his  face  ! 
I  was  too  startled  to  laugh,  but  it  ought  to 
have  been  sketched  on  the  spot.  No  ap- 
ple ever  was  more  rosy,  no  snake-skin 
ever  more  wrinkled.  Eyes,  blue  and 
keen  as  steel,  gleamed  out  at  me  from 
beneath  enormous  shaggy  brows,  and 
his  nose  and  chin  were  precisely  like 
Punch's.  I  wonder  what  he  thought  of 
me?  My  eyes  were  as  round  as  mar- 
bles, and  I  do  believe  my  mouth  was 
wide  open.  He  gave  a  sort  of  nod,  and 
in  a  strange  dialect  said  something  to 
which  I  in  my  bewilderment  answered 
"  Ja,"  being  the  one  single  word  of  Dutch 
I  know.  This  misleading  reply  encour- 
aged my  weird  visitor  to  sit  down  on  the 
steps  before  me,  to  take  off  his  hat,  mop 
his  thin,  long  gray  locks,  and  to  launch 
forth  with  much  pantomime  into  a  long 
story  of  which  I  did  not  understand  one 
word,  for  the  simple  reason  that  it  was 
all  literally  in  High  Dutch.  Here  was  a 
pretty  predicament !  —  alone  with  a  gob- 
lin to  whom  I  had  just  told  a  flat  false- 
hood, for  evidently  his  first  inquiry,  of 
which  I  only  caught  the  word  "Hol- 
lands," and  which  I  imagined  to  refer 
to  gin,  must  have  been  a  demand  as  to 
whether  I  understood  his  language  !  And 
I  had  said  "Ja!"  It  was  dreadful.  In 
my  dismay  I  remembered  having  heard 


somebody  say  "Nic,"  and  I  even  follow- 
ed it  up  with  a  faltering  "  Stehts  nic  "  ("I 
don't  understand"),  which  also  came  to 
me  in  my  extremity.  This  contradictory 
answer  puzzled  my  old  gentleman,  and 
he  looked  at  me  frowningly ;  but  I  had 
always  heard  that  courage  is  everything 
with  goblins,  so  I  smiled  and  said  in- 
quiringly "Ja?"  again.  He  shook  his 
head  reprovingly,  and  then  by  the  aid 
of  ticking  off  each  word  on  his  fingers, 
and  stopping  at  it  until  he  thought  I  un- 
derstood, he  contrived,  by  means  of  Ger- 
man and  English  and  Kafir,  only  break- 
ing out  into  Dutch  at  the  very  interesting 
parts,  to  tell  me  that  he  was  in  search  of 
a  little  black  ox.  I  must  clearly  under- 
stand that  it  was  "  Schwartz,"  and  also 
that  the  "pfennigs"  it  had  cost  were 
many.  The  ox  seems  to  have  been  a 
regular  demon  if  his  story  was  anything 
like  true.  No  rest  had  he  had  (here  a 
regular  pantomime  of  going  to  sleep) ; 
from  over  Berg  had  he  come ;  he  had 
bought  this  wayward  beast  from  one 
Herr  Schmidt,  an  inkosi.  A  great  deal 
of  shaking  of  the  head  here,  which  must 
have  meant  that  this  Herr  Inkosi  had 
cheated  him.  Yet  I  longed  to  ask  how 
one  could  get  the  better  of  a  goblin.  I 
didn't  know  it  was  to  be  done.  From 
the  moment  the  "  klein  schwartz  "  ox 
changed  masters  my  small  friend's  trou- 
bles began.  "Friin  in  de  morgen  "  did 
that  ox  get  away  every  day  :  in  vain  was 
it  put  in  kraals  at  night,  in  vain  did  Ka- 
firs search  for  it  (great  acting  here  of 
following  up  a  spoor) :  it  was  over  the 
berg  and  far  away.  He  was  drie  tags 
mit  nodings  to  eat  av  mealies.  It  was  a 
long  story,  but  the  refrain  was  always, 
"Vere  hat  dat  leetel  ox,  dat  schwartzen 
ox,  got  to  ?"  If  I  am  to  say  the  exact 
truth,  he  once  demanded,  "  Vere  das 
tcufels  dat  leetel  ox  hat  be  ?"  but  I  look- 
ed so  shocked  that  he  took  off  his  steeple- 
crowned  hat  deprecatingly.  "Sprechen 
Sie  Kafir  ?"  I  asked  in  despair,  but  it  was 
no  better.  His  countenance  brightened, 
and  he  went  through  it  all  again  in  Ka- 
fir, and  the  "  inkomo"  was  quite  as  prom- 
inent as  the  ox  had  been.  Of  course  / 
meant  that  he  should  speak  to  some  of 
my  Kafirs  about  it  if  he  knew  their  Ian- 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


guage.  I  believe  we  should  have  been 
there  to  this  day  talking  gibberish  to  each 

other  if  little  G had  not  appeared 

suddenly  round  the  corner  and  taken  the 
matter  into  his  own  hands. 

"Why,  what  a  queer  old  man  that  is, 
mumsey  !  Wherever  did  you  find  him, 
and  what  does  he  want  ?"  G demand- 
ed with  true  colonial  brevity. 

"  I  think  he  is  looking  for  a  little  black 
ox,"  I  answered  guardedly. 

"  Ja,  wohl,  dat  is  it  —  ein  leetel  black 
ox,  my  tear"  (I  trust  he  meant  G ). 

"  Oh,  all  right !"  G shouted,  spring- 
ing up.  "Osa  (come),  old  gentleman. 


There's  rather  a  jolly  little  black  bullock 
over  there :  I  know,  because  I've  been 
with  Jack  there  looking  for  a  snake." 
The  goblin  was  on  his  feet  in  a  mo- 
ment, with  every  wrinkle  on  the  alert. 
14  Banks,  my  tear  umfan  :  du  air  ein  gut 
leetel  boy.  Friih  in  de  morgen ;"  and 
so  on  with  the  whole  story  over  again  to 

G ,  who  understood  him  much  better 

than  I  did,  and  gave  me  quite  a  minute 
account  of  the  "leetel  black  ox's  "  adven- 
tures. The  last  thing  G saw  of  it 

it  was  taking  a  fence  like  a  springbok, 
with  the  goblin  and  three  Kafirs  in  full 
chase  after  it. 


8 


IP.A.:R,T 


MARITZBURG,  August  i,  1876. 

THE  brief  winter  season  seems  al- 
ready ended  and  over,  so  far  as 
the  crisp,  bracing  atmosphere  is  con- 
cerned. For  many  days  past  it  has  been 
not  only  very  hot  in  the  sun,  but  a  light 
hot  air  has  brooded  over  everything.  Not 
strong  enough  to  be  called  a  hot  wind,  it 
is  yet  like  the  quivering  haze  out  of  a 
furnace-mouth.  I  pity  the  poor  trees:  it 
is  hard  upon  them.  Not  a  drop  of  rain 
has  fallen  for  three  months  to  refresh 
their  dried-up  leaves  and  thirsting  roots, 
and  now  the  sun  beats  down  with  a  fiercer 
fire  than  ever,  and  draws  up  the  drop  of 
moisture  which  haply  may  linger  low 
down  in  the  cool  earth.  Cool  earth,  did 
I  say  ?  I  fear  that  is  a  figure  of  speech. 
It  almost  burns  one's  feet  through  the 
soles  of  thin  boots,  and  each  particle  of 
dust  is  like  a  tiny  cinder.  I  think  regret- 
fully of  the  pleasant,  sharp,  frosty  morn- 
ings and  evenings,  even  though  the  days 
are  lengthening,  and  one  may  now  count 
by  weeks  the  time  before  the  rain  will 
come,  and  fruits  and  vegetables,  milk 
and  butter,  be  once  more  obtainable 
with  comparative  ease.  What  I  most 
long  for,  however,  is  a  good  pelting 
shower,  a  down- pour  which  will  fill  the 
tanks  and  make  water  plentiful.  I  am 
always  rushing  out  in  the  sun  to  see  that 
the  horses  and  the  fowls  and  all  the  an- 
imals have  enough  water  to  drink.  In 
spite  of  all  my  care,  they  all  seem  in  a 
chronic  state  of  thirst,  for  the  Kafirs  are 
too  lazy  and  careless  to  think  that  it  mat- 
ters if  tubs  get  empty  or  if  a  horse  comes 
home  too  late  to  be  led  down  to  the  river 
with  the  rest.  The  water  that  I  drink 
myself — and  I  drink  nothing  else — would 
give  a  sanitary  inspector  a  fit  to  look  at, 
even  after  it  has  passed  through  two  fil- 
ters. But  it  goes  through  many  vicissi- 
tudes before  it  reaches  this  comparative- 
ly clean  stage.  It  is  brought  from  the 
river  (which  is  barely  able  to  move  slug- 
gishly over  its  ironstone  bed)  through 
114 


clouds  of  dust.  If  the  Kafir  rests  his 
pails  for  a  moment  outside  before  pour- 
ing their  contents  into  the  first  large  fil- 
ter, the  pony,  who  is  always  on  the  look- 
out for  a  chance,  plunges  his  muzzle  in 
among  the  green  boughs  with  snorts  of 
satisfaction ;  the  pigeons  fly  in  circles 
round  the  man's  head,  trying  to  take  ad- 
vantage of  the  first  favorable  moment 
for  a  bath  ;  and  not  only  dogs,  but  even 
cats,  press  up  for  a  drop.  This  is  be- 
cause it  is  cool,  and  not  so  dusty  as  that 
in  pans  outside.  There  is  not  a  leaf  any- 
where yet  large  enough  to  give  shade, 
and  the  water  outside  soon  becomes 
loathsomely  hot.  Of  course  it  is  an  ex- 
ceptionally dry  season.  All  the  weather 
and  all  the  seasons  I  have  ever  met  with 
in  the  course  of  my  life  always  have  been 
quite  out  of  the  ordinary  routine.  Doubt- 
less, it  is  kindly  meant  on  the  part  of  the 
inhabitants,  and  is  probably  intended  as 
a  consolation  to  the  new-comer.  But  I 
am  too  well  used  to  it  to  be  comforted. 
Even  when  one  comes  back  to  dear  old 
England  after  three  or  four  years'  ab- 
sence, and  arrives,  say,  early  in  May, 
everybody  professes  to  be  amazed  that 
there  should  be  a  keen  east  wind  blow- 
ing, and  apologizes  for  the  black  hard 
buds  on  the  lilac  trees  and  the  iron-bound 
earth  and  sky  by  assurances  that "  There 
have  been  such  east  winds  this  year!" 
Just  as  if  there  are  not  "such  "  east  winds 
every  year ! 

After  these  last  few  amiable  lines  it 
k  will  hardly  surprise  any  one  to  hear  that 
this  is  the  irritating  hot  wind  which  is 
blowing  so  lightly.  You  must  know  we 
have  hot  winds  from  nearly  opposite 
quarters.  There  is  one  from  the  north- 
east, which  comes  down  from  Delagoa 
Bay  and  all  the  fever -haunted  region 
thereabouts,  which  is  more  unhealthy 
than  this.  That  furnace-breath  makes 
you  languid  and  depressed :  exertion  is 
almost  an  impossibility,  thought  is  an 
effort.  But  this  light  air  represents  the 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


nealthy  hot  wind,  a  nice  rasping  zephyr 
— a  wind  which  dries  you  up  like  a  Nor- 
mandy pippin,  and  puts  you  and  keeps 
you  in  the  most  peevish,  discontented 
frame  of  mind.  It  has  swept  over  the 
burning  deserts  of  the  interior,  and  comes 
from  the  north-west,  and  I  can  only  say 
there  is  aggravation  in  every  puff  of  it. 
The  only  person  toward  whom  I  feel  at 
all  kindly  disposed  when  this  wind  is 
blowing  is  Jim.  Jim  is  a  new  Kafir-lad, 
Tom's  successor,  for  Tom's  battles  with 
Charlie  became  rather  too  frequent  to 
be  borne  in  a  quiet  household.  Jim  is 
such  a  nice  boy,  and  Jim's  English  is 
delightful.  He  began  by  impressing 
upon  me  through  Maria  that  he  had 
"  no  Inglis,"  but  added  immediately,  "Jim 
no  sheeky."  Certainly  he  is  not  cheeky, 
but,  on  the  contrary,  the  sweetest  -  tem- 
pered creature  you  could  meet  with  any- 
where. He  must  be  about  sixteen  years 
old,  but  he  is  over  six  feet  high,  and  as 
straight  as  a  willow  wand.  To  see  Jim 
stride  along  by  the  side  of  my  little  car- 
riage is  to  be  reminded  of  the  illustra- 
tions to  the  Seven -League -Boots  story. 
At  first,  Jim  tried  to  coil  and  fold  and 
double  his  long  legs  into  the  small  perch 
at  the  back  of  the  pony-carriage,  but  he 
always  tumbled  out  at  a  rut  in  the  road, 
and  kept  me  in  perpetual  terror  of  his 
snapping  himself  in  two.  Not  that  there 
are  many  ruts  now  in  my  road,  I  would 
have  you  know.  It  is  all  solid  dust,  about 
three  feet  deep  everywhere.  A  road- 
party  worked  at  it  in  their  own  peculiar 
way  for  many  weeks  this  fall,  and  the 
old  Dutch  overseer  used  to  assure  me 
with  much  pride  every  time  I  passed  that 
he  "vas  making  my  ladyships  a  boofler 
road  mit  grabels."  Of  course  it  was  the 
queen's  highway  at  which  he  and  his 
Kafirs  dug,  but  it  pleased  him  to  regard 
it  as  my  private  path,  and  this  gave  him 
greater  courage  to  throw  out  "schnapps  " 
as  a  suggestion  worthy  of  my  attention. 

Will  you  believe  me  when  I  declare 
that  in  spite  of  all  these  weary  weeks  of 
drought,  in  spite  of  this  intense  blaze  of 
burning  sunshine  all  through  the  thirsty 
day,  the  long  stretches  of  the  blackened 
country  are  showing  tender  green  shoots 
round  the  stumps  of  the  old  rank  grass 


burned  away  long  ago  ?  It  seems  little 
short  of  a  miracle  when  one  sees  the 
baked  earth,  hard  as  a  granite  cliff,  dry 
as  a  last  year's  bone,  and  through  its 
parched,  pulverized  surface  little  clumps 
of  trefoil  are  springing  everywhere,  and 
young  blades  of  grass.  On  the  mulber- 
ry trees,  too,  the  buttons  have  burst  into 
tufts  of  dainty  leaves,  which  assert  them- 
selves more  and  more  every  day,  and 
herald  that  wealth  of  freshest  greenery 
in  which  Natal  was  clad  over  hill  and 
dale  when  first  I  saw  her  last  November. 
Then  I  could  not  take  in  that  the  smiling 
emerald  downs  which  stretched  around 
me  could  ever  be  the  arid  desolate  waste- 
land they  now  appear;  and  now  I  can 
scarcely  summon  up  faith  enough  to  be- 
lieve in  the  miracle  of  the  spring  resur- 
rection close  at  hand,  of  which  these  few 
lonely  leaves  and  blades  are  the  sign  and 
token. 

Yes,  Jim's  English  is  very  droll— all 
the  more  so  for  his  anxiety  to  practice 
it,  in  spite  of  his  protestations  to  the  con- 
trary. Jim  is  a  great  meteorologist,  un- 
like the  majority  of  Kafirs,  from  whom 
you  can  extract  no  opinion  whatever. 
They  say  the  rain-doctor  is  the  proper 
person  to  determine  whether  it  is  going 
to  be  fair  or  foul  weather.  I  have  ask- 
ed Charlie  whether  it  was  going  to  rain 
when  the  heavy  clouds  have  been  almost 
over  our  heads,  just  to  hear  what  he 
would  say;  and  Charlie  has  answered 
with  Turkish  fatalism,  "Oh,  ma',  I  doan 
know :  if  it  like  to  rain,  it  will,  but  if  it 
don't,  it  won't."  Now,  Jim  does  proffer 
an  opinion,  expressed  by  a  good  deal 
of  pantomime,  and  Jim  is  quite  as  often 
right  as  most  weather-prophets.  Jim 
studies  the  skies  on  account  of  getting 
and  keeping  his  wood -heap  dry,  and 
prides  himself  on  neat  stacks  of  chop- 
ped-up  fuel.  I  gave  Jim  an  orange  the 
other  day,  and  he  took  it  in  the  graceful 
Kafir  fashion  with  both  hands,  and  burst 
forth  into  all  his  English  at  once:  "Oh, 
danks,  ma' :  inkosa-casa  vezy  kind  new 
face,  vezy.  Jim  no  sheeky :  oh  yaas, 
all  lite  !"  His  meaning  can  only  dimly 
be  guessed  at,  especially  about  the  new 
face.  I  wish  with  all  my  heart  I  could 
get  a  new  face,  for  this  one  is  much  the 


n6 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


worse  for  the  South  African  sun  and  my 
inveterate  habit  of  loitering  about  out  of 
doors  whenever  I  can,  and  spending  most 
of  my  waking  hours  in  the  verandah. 

AUGUST  4. 

Since  I  last  wrote  there  has  not  been 
much  loitering  out  of  doors,  nor  has  any 
one  who  could  possibly  avoid  doing  so 
even  put  his  nose  outside.  The  hot  zephyr 
I  alluded  to  three  days  ago  suddenly 
changed  to  a  furious  hot  gale,  the  worst 
I  have  ever  seen — hotter  than  a  New 
Zealand  nor'-wester,  and  as  heavy  as  a 
hurricane.  The  clouds  of  dust  baffle 
description.  The  direction,  too,  from 
whence  it  came  must  also  have  changed, 
for  a  sort  of  epidemic  of  low  fever  is 
hanging  about,  and  the  influenza  would 
be  ludicrous  from  the  number  of  its  vic- 
tims if  it  were  not  so  disagreeable  and 
so  dangerous.  All  the  washermen  and 
washerwomen  in  the  whole  place  are  ill, 
the  entire  body  of  Kafir  police  is  or,  the 
sick  list,  all  one's  servants  are  laid  up 
— Charlie  says  pathetically,  "  Too  moch 
plenty  cough  inside,  ma'  " — and  every- 
body looks  wretched.  The  "inkos" 
which  one  hears  in  passing  are  either 
a  hoarse  growl  or  a  wheezy  whisper. 
When  you  consider  how  absolutely  dry 
the  atmosphere  must  be,  it  is  difficult  to 
imagine  how  people  catch  such  constant 
and  severe  colds  as  they  do  here.  I  am 
bound  to  say,  however,  that  except  with 
this  influenza  a  cold  does  not  last  so  long 
as  it  does  in  England,  but  I  think  you 
catch  cold  oftener ;  and  the  reason  is  not 
far  to  seek.  In  these  hot  winds,  or  out 
of  the  broiling  midday  sun,  some  visitor 
rides  up  from  town,  and  arrives  here  or 
elsewhere  very  hot  indeed.  Then  he 
comes  into  a  little  drawing-room  with  its 
thick  stone  walls  and  closed,  darkened 
windows,  and  exclaims,  "  How  delight- 
fully cool  you  are  here  !"  but  in  five 
minutes  he  is  shivering;  and  the  next 
thing  I  hear  is  that  he  has  cold  or  fever. 
Yet  what  is  one  to  do  ?  I  have  to  keep 
in-doors  all  day  :  I  must  have  a  cool 
room  to  sit  in ;  and  as  long  as  one  has 
not  been  taking  exercise  out  of  doors,  it 
does  no  harm. 

The  gale  of  hot  wind  seemed  to  set 


the  whole  place  on  fire.  I  should  not 
have  thought  a  tussock  had  been  left 
anywhere,  but  every  night  lately  has 
been  made  bright  as  day  by  the  glare 
of  blazing  hillsides.  Then  I  leave  my 
readers  to  imagine  the  state  of  a  house 
into  which  all  these  fine  particles  of  soot 
filter  through  ill-fitting  doors  and  win- 
dows, driven  by  a  furious  hurricane.  The 

other  morning  poor  little  G 's  plate 

of  porridge  set  aside  to  cool  in  the  din- 
ing-room, with  every  door  and  window 
closed,  had  a  layer  of  black  burnt  grass 
on  the  top  in  five  minutes ;  and  the  state 
of  the  tablecloth,  milk,  etc.  baffles  de- 
scription. Indeed,  one's  life  is  a  life  of 
dusting  and  scrubbing  and  cleaning  gen- 
erally, if  a  house  is  to  be  kept  even  tol- 
erably tidy  in  these  parts. 

I  forget  if  I  have  ever  told  you  of  the 
spiders  here.  They  are  another  sorrow 
to  the  careful  housewife,  spinning  webs 
in  every  corner,  across  doorways,  filling 
up  spaces  beneath  tables,  flinging  their 
aerial  bridges  from  chair  to  chair — all  in 
a  single  night — and  regarding  glass  and 
china  ornaments  merely  as  a  nucleus  or 
starting-point  for  a  filmy  labyrinth. 

AUGUST  10. 

Every  now  and  then,  when  I  give  way 
to  temper  and  a  hot  wind  combined,  and 
write  crossly  about  the  climate,  my  con- 
science reproaches  me  severely  with  a 
want  of  fairness  when  the  weather 
changes,  as  it  generally  does  directly, 
and  we  have  some  exquisite  days  and 
nights.  For  instance,  directly  after  I 
last  wrote  our  first  spring  showers  fell — 
very  coyly,  it  is  true,  and  almost  as  if  the 
clouds  had  forgotten  how  to  dissolve  into 
rain.  Still,  the  very  smell  of  the  moist 
earth  was  delicious,  and  ever  since  that 
wet  night  the  whole  country  has  been 

Growing  glorious 
Quietly,  day  by  day  ; 

and  except  in  the  very  last-burnt  patches 
a  faint  and  hesitating  tinge  of  palest 
green  is  stealing  over  all  the  bleak  hill- 
sides. My  poor  bamboos  are  still  mere 
shriveled  ghosts  of  the  fair  green  plumes 
which  used  to  rustle  and  wave  all  through 
the  drenching  summer  weather,  but  ev- 
erything else  is  pushing  a  leaf  here  and 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


a  shoot  there  wherever  it  can,  and,  joy 
of  joys !  there  has  been  no  dust  for  a 
day  or  two.  All  looks  washed  and  re- 
freshed:  parched-up  Nature  accepts  this 
shower  as  the  first  installment  of  the  del- 
uge which  is  coming  presently.  In  the 
mean  time,  the  air  is  delicious,  and  even 
the  poor  influenza  victims  are  creeping 
about  in  the  sunshine.  The  Kafirs  have 
suffered  most,  and  it  is  really  quite  sad 
to  see  how  weak  they  are,  and  how 
grateful  for  a  little  nourishing  food,  which 
they  absolutely  require  at  present. 

I  took  advantage  of  the  first  of  these 
new  spring  days,  with  their  cool  air,  to 
make  a  little  expedition  I  have  long  had 
on  my  mind.  From  my  verandah  I  can 
see  on  the  opposite  hills,  at  about  my 
own  lofty  elevation  of  fifty  feet  or  so,  the 
white  tents  beyond  the  dark  walls  of  Fort 
Napier.  Now,  this  little  spot  represents 
the  only  shelter  and  safety  in  all  the 
country-side  in  case  of  a  "difficulty" 
with  our  swarming  dusky  neighbors. 
Here  and  there  in  other  townships  there 
are  "laagers,"  or  loopholed  enclosures, 
within  which  wagons  can  be  dragged 
and  a  stand  made  against  a  sudden  Ka- 
fir raid ;  but  here,  at  the  seat  of  govern- 
ment, there  is  a  battalion  of  an  English 
regiment,  a  thousand  strong,  and  a  regu- 
lar, orthodox  fortified  place,  with  some 
heavy  pieces  of  ordnance.  But  you 
know  of  old  how  terribly  candid  I  am, 
so  I  must  confess  at  once  that  it  was  not 
with  the  smallest  idea  of  ascertaining 
for  myself  the  military  strength  and  ca- 
pability of  Fort  Napier  that  I  paid  it  a 
visit  that  fine  spring  morning.  No  :  my 
object  was  of  the  purest  domestic  cha- 
racter, and  indeed  was  only  to  see  with 
my  own  eyes  what  these  new  Kafir  huts 
were  like,  with  a  view  to  borrowing  the 
idea  for  a  spare  room  here.  Could  any- 
thing be  more  peaceful  than  such  a  pro- 
ject? I  felt  like  the  old  wife  in  Jean 
Ingelow's  Brides  of  En  derby  as  I  drove 
slowly  up  the  steep  hill,  at  the  brow  of 
which  I  could  already  see  the  pacing 
sentries  and  the  grim  cannon-mouth — 

And  why  should  this  thing  be? 
What  danger  lowers  by  land  or  sea? 

I  might  have  answered  as  she  did, 

For  storms  be  none,  and  pyrates  flee  ; 


for,  although  there  are  skirmishes  be- 
yond our  borders,  we  ourselves,  thank 
God !  dwell  in  peace  and  safety  within 
them.  Nothing  could  be  more  pictu- 
resque than  the  gleaming  white  points 
now  standing  sharply  out  in  snowy  van- 
dykes  against  a  cobalt  sky,  or  else  toned 
harmoniously  down  against  a  soft  gray 
cloud ;  now  glistening  on  a  background 
of  green  hillside,  or  nestling  dimly  in  a 
dusty  hollow.  There  is  only  barrack- 
room  for  half  the  regiment,  and  the  oth- 
er half,  under  canvas,  takes  a  good  many 
tents  and  covers  a  good  deal  of  ground. 
Although  the  soldiers  have  got  through 
the  winter  very  well,  it  would  not  be 
prudent  to  trust  them  to  the  shelter  of  a 
tent  during  the  coming  summer  months 
of  alternate  flood  and  sunshine.  So  Ka- 
firs have  been  busy  building  nearly  a 
hundred  of  their  huts  on  an  improved 
plan  all  this  dry  weather,  and  these  lit- 
tle dwellings  are  now  just  ready  for  their 
complement  of  five  men  apiece.  They 
are  a  great  step  in  advance  of  the  orig- 
inal Kafir  hut,  and  it  was  for  this  reason 
I  came  to  see  them,  lured  also  by  hearing 
that  they  only  cost  four  pounds  apiece. 
We  are  so  terribly  cramped  for  room 
here,  I  have  only  ventured  on  one  tiny 
addition  —  a  dressing-room  about  as  big 
as  the  cabin  of  a  ship,  which  cost  nearly 
eighty  pounds  to  build  of  stone  like  the 
rest  of  the  house.  So  I  have  had  it  on 
my  mind  for  some  time  that  it  would  be 
a  very  fine  thing  to  build  one  of  these 
glorified  Kafir  huts  close  to  the  house 
for  a  spare  room.  The  real  Kafir  hut  is 
exactly  like  a  beehive,  without  door  or 
window,  and  only  a  small  hole  to  creep 
in  and  out  at.  These  new  military  huts 
have  circular  walls,  five  feet  high  and 
about  a  dozen  feet  in  diameter,  made  of 
closely-woven  wattles,  and  covered  with- 
in and  without  with  clay.  I  stood  watch- 
ing the  Kafirs  working  at  one  for  some 
time.  It  certainly  looked  a  rude  and 
simple  process.  Some  four  or  five  stal- 
wart Kafirs  were  squatting  on  the  ground 
hard  by,  "snuffing"  and  conversing  with 
much  gesticulation  and  merriment.  They 
were  the  off-gang,  I  imagine.  Three  or 
four  more  were  tranquilly  and  in  a  lei- 
surely fashion  trampling  the  wet  clay 


n8 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


and  daubing  it  on  with  their  hands  in- 
side and  out.  They  had  not  the  ghost 
of  a  tool  of  any  sort,  and  yet  the  result 
was  wonderfully  good.  I  wondered  why 
finely-chopped  grass  was  not  mixed  with 
the  clay,  as  I  have  seen  the  New  Zealand 
shepherds  do  in  preparing  the  "  cob  "  for 
their  mud  walls ;  but  I  was  told  that  the 
Kafir  would  greatly  object  to  anything 
so  uncomfortable  for  his  bare  legs  and 
feet.  Of  course,  the  shepherd  works  up 
the  ugly  muss  with  a  spade,  whilst  here 
these  men  slowly  trample  it  to  the  right 
consistency.  The  plastering  is  really  a 
triumph  of  (literally)  handiwork,  though 
the  process  is  exasperatingly  slow.  At 
first  the  mud  comes  out  all  over  thumb- 
marks,  and  dries  so,  but  in  a  day  or  two 
buckets  of  water  are  dashed  over  it,  so 
as  to  remoisten  it,  and  then  it  is  once 
more  patiently  smoothed  all  over  with 
the  palm  of  the  hand  until  an  absolute- 
ly smooth  surface  is  obtained,  as  flat  and 
flawless  as  though  the  best  of  trowels  had 
been  used.  A  neatly -fitting  door  and 
window  have  meantime  been  made  in 
the  regimental  workshop,  and  hung  in 
the  spaces  left  for  them  in  the  wattled 
walls.  More  wattles,  closely  woven  to- 
gether, are  put  on  in  the  shape  of  a  very 
irregular  dome,  and  this  is  thatched  near- 
ly a  foot  deep  with  long  rank  grass  tied 
securely  down  by  endless  ropes  of  finely- 
plaited  grass.  The  result  is  a  spacious, 
cool,  and  most  comfortable  circular  room, 
and  those  which  are  finished  and  fitted  up 
with  shelves  and  camp  furniture  look  as 
nice  as  possible.  A  little  tuft  of  straw  at 
the  apex  of  each  dome  is  at  once  a  light- 
ning-conductor and  a  finish  to  the  quaint 
little  building.  The  plastered  walls  of 
some  huts  are  whitewashed,  but  the  most 
popular  idea  seems  to  be  to  tar  them 
and  make  them  still  more  weather-proof. 
A  crooked  stick  or  two,  being  merely  the 
rough  branch  of  a  tree,  stands  in  the 
centre  and  acts  as  a  musket-rack  and 
tent-pole  to  the  little  dwelling.  The  Ka- 
firs get  only  one  pound  ten  shillings  for 
each  hut,  and  the  wooden  fittings  are 
calculated  to  cost  about  two  pounds  ten 
shillings  more ;  but  I  hear  that  they 
grumble  a  good  deal  on  account  of 
the  distance  from  which  they  have  to 


bring  the  grass,  all  in  the  neighborhood 
having  been  burnt.  They  also  regard  it 
as  women's  work,  for  all  the  kraals  are 
built  by  women. 

On  the  whole,  I  am  more  than  ever 
taken  with  the  idea  of  a  Kafir  spare  room, 
and  quite  hope  to  carry  it  out  some  day, 
the  huts  look  so  cool  and  healthy  and 
clean.  The  thatch  and  mud  walls  will 
keep  off  the  sun  in  the  hot  weather  be- 
fore us ;  and  as  all  the  huts  stand  on  a 
gentle  slope,  there  is  no  fear  of  their  be- 
ing damp.  It  is  wonderful  how  well  the 
soldiers  have  managed  hitherto  under 
canvas,  and  how  healthy  they  have  been ; 
but  I  can  quite  understand  that  it  is  not 
well  to  presume  upon  such  good  luck 
during  another  wet  season.  As  we  were 
up  in  camp,  we  looked  at  all  the  sol- 
diers' arrangements — the  canteen,  where 
mustard  and  pickles  seemed  to  be  the 
most  popular  articles  of  food ;  the  school- 
house,  a  wee  brick  building,  in  which 
both  the  children  and  the  recruits  have 
to  learn,  and  which  is  also  used  as  a 
chapel  on  Sunday.  Everything  was  the 
pink  of  neatness  and  cleanliness,  as  is 
always  the  case  where  soldiers  or  sailors 
live,  and  I  was  much  struck  by  the  ab- 
solute silence  and  repose  of  so  small  an 
enclosure  with  a  thousand  men  inside  it. 
I  wondered  whether  a  thousand  women 
could  have  kept  so  quiet  ?  Of  course  I 
peeped  into  the  kitchen,  and  instantly 
coveted  the  beautiful  brick  oven  out  of 
which  sundry  smoking  platters  were  be- 
ing drawn.  But  curry  and  rice  was  the 
chief  dish  in  the  bill  of  fare  for  that  day, 
and  I  can  only  say  the  smell  was  excel- 
lent and  exceedingly  appetizing.  The 
view  all  round,  too,  was  charming.  Just 
at  our  feet  lay  the  hollow  where  the  men's 
gardens  are.  Such  potatoes  and  pump- 
kins !  such  cabbages  and  onions !  The 
men  delight  in  cultivating  the  willing  soil 
in  which  all  vegetables  grow  so  luxuri- 
antly and  easily ;  and  it  is  so  managed 
that  it  shall  be  a  profit  as  well  as  a  plea- 
sure to  them.  In  many  ways  this  en- 
couragement of  a  taste  for  gardening  is 
good:  there  is  the  first  consideration  of 
the  advantage  to  themselves,  and  it  is 
indirectly  a  boon  to  us,  for  if  a  thousand 
men  were  added  to  the  consumers  of  the 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


119 


few  potatoes  and  vegetables  which  daily 
find  their  way  into  the  Maritzburg  mar- 
ket, I  know  not  what  would  become  of 
us.  Our  last  stroll  was  to  the  brow 
of  another  down  close  by,  also  crowned 
with  white  tents.  Beneath  it  lay  the  mil- 
itary graveyard,  and  I  have  seldom  seen 
anything  more  poetic  and  touching  than 
the  effect  of  this  lovely  garden — for  so  it 
looked,  a  spot  of  purest  green,  tenderly 
cared  for — amid  the  bare  winter  coloring 
of  all  the  country-side.  The  hills  folded 
it  softly,  as  if  it  were  a  precious  place, 
the  sun  lay  brightly  on  it,  and  the  quiet 
sleeping -ground  was  made  orderly  and 
tranquil  by  many  a  sheltering  tree  and 
blooming  shrub.  I  promised  myself  tc 
come  in  summer  and  look  down  on  it 
again  when  all  the  wealth  of  roses  and 
geraniums  are  out,  and  when  these  brown 
hillsides  are  green  and  glorious  with  their 
tropic  pasture. 

You  will  think  I  have  indeed  taken  a 
sudden  mania  for  soldiers  and  camps 
when  I  tell  you  that  a  very  few  days 
after  my  visit  to  Fort  Napier  I  joyfully 
accepted  the  offer  of  a  friend  to  take 
me  to  see  the  annual  joint  encampment 
of  the  Natal  Carbineers  and  D'Urban 
Mounted  Rifles  out  on  Botha's  Flat,  rath- 
er more  than  halfway  between  this  and 
D'Urban.  Not  only  was  I  delighted  at 
the  chance  of  seeing  that  lovely  bit  of 
country  more  at  my  leisure  than  dash- 
ing through  it  in  the  post-cart,  but  I  have 
always  so  much  admired  the  pluck  and 
spirit  of  this  handful  of  volunteers,  who 
keep  up  the  discipline  and  prestige  of 
their  little  corps  in  the  teeth  of  all  sorts 
of  difficulties  and  discouragements,  that 
I  was  glad  to  avail  myself  of  the  oppor- 
tunity of  paying  them  a  visit  when  they 
were  out  in  camp.  For  many  years  past 
these  smart  light -horse  have  struggled 
on  in  spite  of  obstacles  to  attending  drill, 
want  of  money,  lack  of  public  attention 
and  interest,  and  a  thousand  other  lets 
and  hinderances.  Living  as  we  do  in 
such  a  chronically  precarious  position — 
a  position  in  which  five  minutes'  official 
ill-temper  or  ever  so  trifling  an  injudicious 
action  might  set  the  whole  Kafir  popula- 
tion in  a  blaze  of  discontent,  and  even 
revolt — too  much  importance  cannot,  in 


my  poor  judgment,  be  attached  to  the 
volunteer  movement;  and  it  seems  to 
me  worthy  in  the  highest  degree  of  every 
encouragement  and  token  of  appreciation 
which  it  is  in  our  power  to  give.  Of  ei- 
ther pence  or  praise  these  Natal  mounted 
volunteers  (for  they  would  be  very  little 
use  on  foot  over  such  an  extent  of  rail- 
way-less country)  have  hitherto  had  a 
very  small  share,  and  yet  I  found  the 
pretty  little  camp  as  full  of  military  en- 
thusiasm, as  orderly,  as  severely  simple 
in  its  internal  economy,  as  though  the 
eyes  of  all  Europe  were  upon  it.  Each 
man  there  in  sacrificing  a  week  of  his 
time  was  giving  up  a  good  deal  more 
than  most  volunteers  give  up,  and  it 
would  make  too  long  a  story  if  I  were  to 
enter  into  particulars  of  the  actual  pecu- 
niary loss  which  in  this  country  attends 
the  lawyer  leaving  his  office,  the  clerk 
his  desk,  the  merchant  his  counting- 
house,  and  each  providing  himself  with 
horses,  etc.  to  come  out  here  twice  a 
year  and  drill  pretty  nearly  from  morn- 
ing till  night.  The  real  difficulty,  I  fancy, 
lies  in  subordinates  being  able  to  obtain 
leave.  Every  sugar-estate,  every  office, 
every  warehouse,  has  so  few  white  men 
employed  in  it,  exists  in  such  a  chronic 
state  of  short-handedness,  that  it  is  the 
greatest  inconvenience  to  the  masters  to 
let  their  clerks  go  out.  Both  corps  are 
therefore  stronger  on  paper  than  in  the 
field,  but  from  no  lack  of  willingness  to 
serve  on  the  part  of  the  volunteers  them- 
selves. 

I  don't  want  to  be  spiteful  or  invidious, 
but  I  have  seen  volunteer  camps  nearer 
the  heart  of  civilization,  where  there  were 
flower-gardens  round  the  tents  and  love- 
ly "fixings"  inside,  portable  couches 
and  chairs,  albums,  and  clocks,  besides 
a  French  cook  and  iced  champagne 
flowing  like  a  river.  Dismiss  from  your 
mind  all  ideas  of  that  sort  if  you  come 
with  me  next  year  to  Botha's  Flat.  I 
can  promise  you  scrupulous  and  exquis- 
ite neatness  and  cleanliness,  but  in  every 
other  respect  you  might  as  well  be  in  a 
real  camp  on  active  service.  Even  the 
Kafir  servants  are  left  behind,  the  men 
— some  of  them  very  fine  gentlemen  in- 
deed— cleaning  their  own  horses  and  ac- 


I2O 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


coutrements,  pitching  their  own  tents, 
cooking  their  own  food,  and  in  fact  act- 
ing precisely  as  though  they  had  really 
taken  the  field  in  an  enemy's  country. 
The  actual  drill,  therefore — though  more 
than  half  the  hours  of  daylight  are  spent 
in  the  saddle  under  the  instruction  of 
one  of  the  most  enthusiastic  and  compe- 
tent drill-instructors  you  could  find  any- 
where— is  by  no  means  all  that  is  prac- 
ticed in  these  brief,  hardly-won  camp- 
days.  The  men  learn  to  rely  solely  on 
their  own  resources.  Their  commissariat 
is  arranged  by  themselves,  one  single 
small  wagon  to  each  corps  conveying 
tents,  forage,  stores,  firewood — all  that 
is  needed  for  man  and  horse — for  ten 
days  or  so.  They  have  no  "base  of 
operations  "  —  nothing  and  nobody  to 
depend  upon  but  themselves.  It  is 
literally  a  "  flying  camp,"  and  all  the 
more  interesting  for  being  so  evident- 
ly what  we  shall  most  need  in  case  of 
any  native  difficulty.  I  don't  suppose 
they  ever  dream  of  visitors,  for  in  this 
languid  land  few  people  would  journey 
thirty  miles  to  look  at  anything,  espe- 
cially in  a  hot  wind.  Nor  am  I  sure  the 
volunteers  want  visitors.  It  is  real,  earn- 
est, practical  hard  work  with  them,  done 
with  their  utmost  diligence,  and  without 
expecting  the  smallest  reward,  even  in 
fair  words.  It  strikes  me  as  very  re- 
markable and  characteristic  of  the  lack 
of  general  interest  in  public  subjects 
how  little  one  hears  of  the  very  men  on 
whom  we  may  at  any  moment  be  only 
too  glad  to  rely.  However,  I  never  can 
attempt  to  fathom  causes  :  rather  let  me 
describe  effects  for  you  as  best  I  may. 

And  a  very  pretty  effect  the  camp  has 
as  we  dash  round  the  shoulder  of  a 
steep  hill  with  the  brake  hard  down,  the 
leaders  plunging  wildly  along  with  slack 
traces,  and  a  general  appearance  of  an 
impending  upset  over  everything.  It 
has  been  a  lovely  drive,  though  rather 
hot,  but  the  roads  are  ever  so  much 
better  than  they  were  in  the  summer, 
and  I  have  never  seen  the  country  look- 
ing more  beautiful,  as  it  seems  to  grow 
greener  with  every  mile  out  of  Maritz- 
burg.  When  the  hills  open  out  sudden- 
ly and  show  th«  y^it  fertile  cleft  of  un- 


dulating downs,  green  ravines  with  trick- 
ling silver  threads  down  them,  and  pur- 
ple mountains  in  the  distance  stretching 
away  to  the  coast,  which  is  known  as  the 
Inanda  Location,  one  feels  as  if  one  were 
looking  at  the  Happy  Valley. 

O  mortal  man,  who  livest  here  by  toil, 
Do  not  complain  of  this,  thy  hard  estate, 

for  neither  the  imaginary  kingdom  of 
Amhara  nor  any  other  kingdom  in  all 
the  fair  earth  can  show  a  more  poetical 
or  suggestive  glimpse  of  scenic  beauty. 
Yet  when  a  few  miles  more  of  rushing 
and  galloping  through  the  soft  air  brings 
us  to  the  top  of  the  pass  of  the  Inchanga, 
I  make  up  my  mind  that  that  is  the 
most  beautiful  stretch  of  country  my  eyes 
have  ever  beheld.  It  is  too  grand  to  de- 
scribe, too  complete  to  break  up  into 
fragments  by  words.  Far  down  among 
the  sylvan  slopes  of  the  park-like  fore- 
ground the  Umgeni  winds,  with  the  sun- 
shine glinting  here  and  there  on  its  wa- 
ters :  beyond  are  bold,  level  mountains 
with  rich  deep  indigo  shadows  and  lofty 
crests  cut  off  straight  against  the  dappled 
sky,  according  to  the  South  African  for- 
mation. But  we  soon  climb  the  lofty 
saddle,  and  put  the  brake  hard  down 
again  for  the  worst  descent  on  the  road. 
If  good  driving  and  skill  and  care  can 
save  us,  we  need  not  be  nervous,  for  we 
have  all  these ;  but  the  state  of  the  har- 
ness fills  me  with  apprehension,  and  it  is 
little  short  of  a  miracle  why  it  does  not 
all  give  way  at  once  and  tumble  off  the 
horses'  backs.  Luckily,  there  is  very  lit- 
tle of  it  to  begin  with,  and  the  original 
leather  is  largely  supplemented  by  reins 
or  strips  of  dried  bullock  hide,  so  we  hold 
together  until  the  vehicle  draws  up  at 
the  door  of  a  neat  little  wayside  inn, 
where  we  get  out  and  begin  at  once  to 
rub  our  elbows  tenderly,  for  they  are 
all  black  and  blue.  There  is  the  camp, 
however,  on  yonder  green  down,  and 
here  are  two  of  the  officers  from  it  wait- 
ing for  us,  and  wanting  to  know  all  about 
hours  and  plans  and  so  forth.  A  little 
rest  and  luncheon  are  first  on  the  pro- 
gramme, and  a  good  deal  of  soap  and 
water  also  for  us  travelers,  and  then,  the 
afternoon  being  still  young,  we  mount 
our  horses  and  canter  up  the  rising  ground 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


121 


to  where  the  flagstaff  stands.  The  men 
are  just  falling  in  for  their  third  and  last 
drill,  which  will  last  till  sundown,  so 
there  is  time  to  go  round  the  pretty  little 
spot  and  admire  the  precision  and  neat- 
ness, the  serviceable,  business-like  air,  of 
everything.  There  is  the  path  the  sen- 
tries tread,  already  worn  perfectly  bare, 
but  straight  as  though  it  had  been  ruled : 
yonder  is  the  bit  of  sod-fencing  thrown 
up  as  a  shelter  to  the  kettles  and  frying- 
pans.  The  kitchen  range  consists  of 
half  a  dozen  forked  sticks  to  leeward  of 
this  rude  shelter,  and  each  troop  con- 
tributes a  volunteer  cook  and  commis- 
sariat officer.  The  picket-ropes  for  the 
horses  run  down  the  centre  of  the  little 
camp,  and  we  must  look  at  the  neat  pile 
of  blankets  and  nose-bags  marked  with 
separate  initials.  The  officers'  tents  are 
at  one  end,  and  the  guard  tents  at  the 
other,  and  those  for  the  privates,  holding 
five  men  each,  are  between.  It  is  all  as 
sweet  and  clean  and  neat  as  possible, 
and  one  can  easily  understand  what  is 
stated  almost  as  a  joke — that  the  first 
night  in  camp  no  one  could  sleep  for  his 
own  and  his  neighbor's  cough,  and  now 
there  is  not  such  a  sound  to  be  heard. 

We  are  coming  back  into  camp  pres- 
ently, for  I  am  invited  to  dine  at  the  of- 
ficers' mess  to-night,  so  we  must  make 
the  most  of  the  daylight.  It  is  a  gray 
evening,  and  the  hot  wind  has  died 
away,  allowing  the  freshness  from  the 
hills  to  steal  down  to  this  green  spur, 
which  is  yet  high  enough  to  be  out  of 
the  cold  mists  of  the  valley.  The  drill 
is  not  very  amusing  for  a  lady  this  after- 
noon, because  it  is  real  hard  work — pa- 
tiently doing  the  same  thing  over  and 
over  again  until  each  little  point  is  per- 
fect—  until  the  horses  are  steady  and 
the  men  move  with  the  ease  and  precis- 
ion of  a  machine.  But  it  is  just  because 
there  is  little  else  to  distract  one's  atten- 
tion that  I  can  notice  what  fine  stalwart 
young  fellows  they  all  are,  and  how  thor- 
oughly in  earnest.  Their  uniforms  and 
accoutrements  are  simple,  but  natty,  and 
clean  as  a  new  pin,  the  horses  especially 
being  ever  so  much  better  groomed  and 
turned  out  by  their  masters'  hands  than 
if  each  had  been  saddled  by  his  usual 


Kafir  groom.  So,  after  a  short  while  of 
watching  the  little  squadron  patiently 
wheel  and  trot  and  advance  by  those 
mysterious  "fours,"  manoeuvre  across  a 
swamp,  charge  down  a  hill,  skirmish  up 
that  burnt  slope  over  there,  and  so  forth, 
we  leave  them  hard  at  work,  and  canter 
over  some  ridges  to  see  what  lies  be- 
yond. But  there  is  nothing  much  to  re- 
ward us,  and  the  only  effect  of  our  long 
evening  ride  is  to  make  us  all  raven- 
ously hungry  and  anxious  for  six  o'clock 
and  dinner.  Long  before  that  hour  the 
dusk  has  crept  down,  and  by  the  time 
we  have  returned,  and  I  have  exchanged 
my  riding-habit  for  a  splendid  dinner- 
costume  of  ticking,  it  is  cold  enough  and 
dark  enough  to  make  us  glad  of  all  the 
extra  wraps  we  can  find,  and  of  the  light 
and  shelter  of  the  snug  little  tent.  Here, 
again,  it  is  real  camp  fare.  I  am  given 
the  great  luxury  of  the  encampment— to 
sit  upon  a  delicious  karosse,  or  rug  of 
dressed  goat  skins.  It  is  snowy  white, 
and  soft  and  flexible  as  a  glove  on  the 
wrong  side,  and  on  the  right  it  is  cover- 
ed with  long,  wavy  cream-colored  hair 
with  black  patches  at  each  corner.  The 
ground  is  strewn  with  grass,  dry  and 
sweet  as  hay,  and  carriage  candles  are 
tied  by  wire  to  a  cross  stick  fastened  on 
a  tent-pole :  the  tablecloth  is  a  piece  of 
canvas,  the  dishes  are  billies,  but  the 
food  is  excellent,  and,  above  all,  we  have 
tea  as  the  sole  beverage  for  everybody. 
We  are  all  provided  with  the  best  of 
sauces,  and  I  assure  you  we  very  soon 
find  ourselves  at  our  dessert  of  oranges 
in  a  basket-lid.  Never  have  any  of  us 
enjoyed  a  meal  more,  and  certainly  ev- 
erybody except  myself  has  earned  it. 
Then  there  is  a  little  tinkling  and  tun- 
ing up  outside,  and  the  band  turns  out 
to  play  to  us.  By  this  time  the  wind  has 
got  up  again  from  another  point,  and  is 
so  bitterly  bleak  and  cold  that  the  mu- 
sicians cannot  possibly  stand  still,  but 
have  to  keep  marching  round  and  round 
the  little  tent,  playing  away  lustily  and 
singing  with  a  good  courage.  Every  now 
and  then  a  stumble  over  a  tent-peg  jerks 
out  a  laugh  instead  of  a  note,  but  still 
there  is  plenty  of  "go  "  and  verve  in  the 
music,  and  half  the  camp  turns  out  to 


122 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA 


join  in  the  chorus  of  "Sherman's  March 
through  Georgia."  We  all  declare  loud- 
ly that  we  are  going  to  carry  "the  flag 
that  makes  us  free  "  through  all  sorts  of 
places,  especially  from  "Atlanta  to  the 
sea,"  and  I  am  quite  sure  that  Sherman's 
own  " dashing  Yankee  boys"  could  not 
possibly  have  made  more  noise  them- 
selves. This  is  followed  by  the  softest 
and  sweetest  of  sentimental  songs,  given 
in  a  beautiful  falsetto  which  would  be  a 
treasure  to  a  chorister;  but  it  is  really  too 
cold  for  sentiment,  so  we  have  one  more 
song,  and  then  the  band  sings  "Auld 
Lang  Syne  "  with  great  spirit,  and  as  the 
wind  is  now  rising  to  a  hurricane,  the  mu- 
sical performances  are  wound  up  some- 
what hurriedly  by  "  God  Save  the  Queen !" 
For  this  the  whole  camp  turns  out  of 
their  own  accord.  The  cooks  leave  their 
fires,  the  fatigue-party  their  scrubbing 
and  the  lazy  ones  their  pipes.  Under 
the  clear  starlight,  with  the  Southern 
Cross  sloping  up  from  the  edge  of  yon- 
der dusky  hill,  with  the  keen  wind  sweep- 
ing round  the  camp  of  this  little  handful 
of  Englishmen  in  a  strange  and  distant 
country,  the  words  of  the  most  beautiful 
tune  in  the  world  come  ringing  as  though 
straight  from  each  man's  heart.  Of  course 
we  all  come  out  of  our  tent  to  stand  bare- 
headed too,  and  I  assure  you  it  is  a  very 
impressive  and  beautiful  moment.  One 
feels  as  one  stands  here  amid  the  flower 
of  the  young  colonists,  each  man  hold- 
ing his  cap  aloft  in  his  strong  right  hand, 
each  man  putting  all  the  fervor  and  pas- 
sion of  his  loyal  love  and  reverence  for 
his  queen  into  every  tone  of  his  voice, 
that  it  is  well  worth  coming  down  for  this 
one  moment  atone.  It  is  very  delight- 
ful to  see  the  English  people,  whether 
in  uniis  or  tens  of  thousands,  greet  their 
sovereign  face  to  face,  but  there  is  some- 
thing even  more  heart-stirring,  more  in- 
expressibly pathetic,  in  such  outbursts  as 
this,  evoked  by  none  of  the  glamour  and 
glitter  of  a  royal  pageant,  but  called  into 
being  merely  by  a  name,  a  tune,  a  sen- 
timent. I  often  think  if  I  were  a  queen 
I  should  be  more  really  gratified  and 
touched  by  the  ardent  and  loyal  love  of 
such  handfuls  of  my  subjects  in  out-of- 
the-way  corners  of  my  empire,  where  the 


sentiment  has  nothing  from  outside  to  fan 
it,  than  with  the  acclamations  of  a  shout- 
ing multitude  as  my  splendor  is  passing 
them  by.  At  all  events,  /  have  never 
seen  soldiers  or  sailors,  regulars  or  vol- 
unteers, more  enthusiastic  over  our  own 
anthem.  It  is  followed  by  cheer  upon 
cheer,  blessing  upon  blessing  on  the  be- 
loved and  royal  name,  until  everybody 
is  perfectly  hoarse  from  shouting  in  such 
a  high  wind,  and  we  all  retreat  into  the 
tiny  tents  for  a  cup  of  coffee  and  —  what 
do  you  think  ?  Stories.  I  am  worse  than 
any  child  in  my  love  of  stories,  and  we 
have  one  or  two  really  good  raconteurs 
in  the  little  knot  of  hosts. 

Of  course  one  of  the  first  inquiries  I 
make  is  whether  any  snakes  have  been 
found  in  the  tents,  and  I  hear,  much  to 
my  disappointment  —  because  the  bare 
fact  will  not  at  all  lend  itself  to  a  story 

for  G when  I  get  home — that  only 

one  little  one  had  crept  beneath  a  folded 
great-coat  (which  is  the  camp  pillow,  it 
seems),  and  been  found  in  the  morning 
curled  up,  torpidly  dozing  in  the  woolen 

warmth.  No,  it  is  not  a  story  G 

will  ever  care  about,  for  the  poor  little 
snake  had  not  even  been  killed :  it  was 
too  small  and  too  insignificant,  they  say, 
and  it  merely  got  kicked  out  of  its  com- 
fortable bed.  To  console  me  for  this 
bald  and  incomplete  adventure,  I  am 
told  some  more  snake-stories,  which,  at 
all  events,  ought  to  have  been  true,  so 
good  are  they.  Here  are  two  for  you, 
one  of  which  especially  delights  me. 

Hard  by  this  very  camp  a  keen  sports- 
man was  lately  pursuing  a  buck.  He 
had  no  dogs  except  a  pet  Skye  terrier  to 
help  him  in  the  chase — nothing  but  his 
rifle  and  a  trusty  Kafir.  Yet  the  hard- 
pressed  buck  had  to  dash  into  a  small, 
solitary  patch  of  thorny  scrub  for  shelter 
and  a  moment's  rest.  In  an  instant  the 
hunter  was  off  his  pony,  and  had  sent 
the  Kafir  into  the  bush  to  drive  out  the 
buck,  that  he  might  have  a  shot  at  it  the 
moment  it  emerged  from  the  cover.  In- 
stead of  the  expected  buck,  however — I 
must  tell  you  the  story  never  states  what 
became  of  him — came  loud  cries  in  Ka- 
fir from  the  scrub  of,  "Oh,  my  mother! 
oh,  my  friends  and  relations !  I  die !  I 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


123 


die !"  The  master,  much  astonished, 
peeped  as  well  as  he  could  into  the  little 
patch  of  tangled  briers  and  bushes,  and 
there  he  saw  his  crouching  Kafir  stoop- 
ing, motionless,  beneath  a  low  branch 
round  which  was  coiled  a  large  and  ven- 
omous snake.  The  creature  had  struck 
at  the  man's  head  as  he  crept  beneath, 
and  its  forked  tongue  had  got  firmly  im- 
bedded in  the  Kafir's  woolly  pate.  The 
wretched  beater  dared  not  stir  an  inch  : 
he  dared  not  even  put  up  his  hands 
to  free  himself;  but  there  he  remained 
motionless  and  despairing,  uttering  these 
loud  shrieks.  His  master  bade  him  stay 
perfectly  still,  and  taking  close  aim  at 
the  snake's  body,  fired  and  blew  it  in 
two.  He  then  with  a  dexterous  jerk  dis- 
entangled the  barbed  tongue,  and  flung 
the  quivering  head  and  neck  outside  the 
bushes.  Here  comes  the  only  marvelous 
part  of  the  story.  "How  did  he  know  it 
was  a  poisonous  snake?"  I  ask.  "Oh, 
well :  the  little  dog  ran  up  to  play  with 
the  head,  and  the  snake — or  rather  the 
half  snake — struck  out  at  it  and  bit  it  in 
the  paw,  and  it  died  in  ten  minutes." 

But  the  following  is  my  favorite  Mun- 
chausen  :  There  was  once  a  certain  val- 
iant man  of  many  adventures  whose  Ka- 
fir title  was  "the  prince  of — fibs,"  and  he 
used  to  relate  the  following  experience  : 
One  day — so  long  ago  that  breech-loading 
guns  were  unknown,  and  the  process  of 
reloading  was  a  five-minute  affair — he 
came  upon  a  large  and  deadly  snake 
making  as  fast  as  it  could  for  its  hole 
hard  by.  Of  course,  such  a  thing  as 
escape  could  not  be  permitted,  and  as 
there  was  no  other  weapon  at  hand,  the 
huntsman  determined  to  shoot  the  huge 
reptile.  But  first  the  gun  must  be  load- 
ed, and  whilst  this  was  being  done, 
lo !  the  snake's  head  had  already  dis- 
appeared in  the  hole  :  in  another  instant 
the  whole  body  would  have  followed.  A 
sudden  grasp  at  the  tail,  a  rapid,  bold 
jerk,  flung  the  creature  a  yard  or  two  off. 
Did  it  attempt  to  show  fight  ?  Oh  no : 
it  glided  swiftly  as  ever  toward  the  same 
shelter  from  which  it  had  been  so  rudely 
plucked.  The  ramrod  was  rapidly  plied, 
the  charge  driven  home,  but  there  was 
yet  the  percussion-cap  to  be  adjusted. 


Once  more  the  tail  was  grasped,  the 
snake  pulled  out  and  flung  still  farther 
away.  Again  did  the  wily  creature  ap- 
proach the  hole.  In  another  instant  the 
cap  would  be  on  and  the  gun  cocked, 
but  everything  depended  on  that  instant. 
The  sportsman  kept  his  eye  fixed  on  his 
artful  foe  even  whilst  his  fingers  deft- 
ly found  and  fixed  the  percussion-cap. 
What,  then,  was  his  horror  and  dismay 
to  find  that  he  had,  for  once,  met  his 
match,  and  that  the  snake,  recognizing 
the  desperate  nature  of  the  position,  and 
keeping  a  wary  eye  on  the  hunter's  move- 
ments, instead  of  going  into  his  hole  for 
the  third  time  in  the  usual  method,  had 
turned  round  and  was  backing  in  tail 
first!  Is  it  not  delightful? 

As  soon  as  we  had  finished  laughing 
at  this  and  similar  stories  it  was  high 
time  to  break  up  the  little  party,  although 
it  was  only  about  the  hour  at  which  one 
sits  down  to  dinner  in  London.  Still, 
there  were  early  parades  and  drills  and 
Goodness  knows  what,  and  I  was  very 
tired  and  sleepy  with  my  jolting  jour- 
ney and  afternoon  on  horseback.  So  we 
all  went  the  "grand  rounds,"  lantern  in 
hand,  and  with  a  deep  feeling  of  admi- 
ration and  pity  for  the  poor  sentries  pa- 
cing up  and  down  on  the  bleak  hillside, 
walked  down  to  the  little  inn,  where  a 
tiny  room,  exactly  like  a  wooden  box, 
had  been  secured  for  me,  the  rest  of 
the  party  climbing  heroically  up  the 
hill  again  to  sleep  on  the  ground  with 
their  saddles  for  a  pillow.  This  was 
playing  at  soldiers  with  a  vengeance, 
was  it  not?  However,  they  all  looked 
as  smart  and  well  as  possible  next  morn- 
ing, when  they  came  to  fetch  me  up  to 
breakfast  in  the  camp.  Then  more  drill 
— very  pretty  this  time — a  sham  attack 
and  defence,  and  then  another  delight- 
ful long  ride  over  a  different  range  of 
hills.  It  was  a  perfect  morning  for  ex- 
ploring, gray  and  cool  and  cloudy  — 
so  different  from  the  hot  wind  and 
scorching  sun  of  yesterday.  We  could 
not  go  fast,  not  only  from  the  steep 
up-and-down  hill,  but  from  the  way 
the  ground  was  turned  up  by  the  ant- 
bears.  Every  few  yards  was  a  deep 
burrow,  often  only  a  few  hours'  old ;  and 


124 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA 


unless  you  had  seen  it  with  your  own  eyes 
I  can  never  make  you  believe  or  under- 
stand the  extraordinarily  vivid  color  of 
this  newly  -  turned  earth.  During  yes- 
terday's journey  I  had  noticed  that  the 
only  wild-flower  yet  out  was  a  curious 
iily  growing  on  a  fat  bulb  more  than 
half  out  of  the  ground,  and  sometimes 
of  a  deep-orange  or  of  a  brilliant-scarlet 
color.  With  the  recollection  of  these 
blossoms  fresh  in  my  mind,  I  noticed  a 
patch  of  bright  scarlet  on  the  face  of 
an  opposite  down,  and  thought  it  must, 
of  course,  be  made  by  lilies.  As  I  was 
very  anxious  to  get  some  bulbs  for  my 
garden,  I  proposed  that  we  should  ride 
across  the  ravine  and  dig  some  up.  "We 
can  come  if  you  like,"  said  the  kindest 
and  pleasantest  of  guides,  "but  I  assure 
you  it  is  only  a  freshly  -  dug  ant-bear's 
hole."  Never  did  I  find  belief  so  dif- 
ficult, and,  like  all  incredulous  people, 
I  was  on  the  point  of  backing  up  my 
hasty  opinion  by  half  a  dozen  pairs  of 
gloves  when  the  same  friendly  guide 
laughingly  pointed  to  a  hole  close  by, 
bidding  me  look  well  at  it  before  risking 
my  gloves.  There  was  nothing  more  to 
be  said.  The  freshly  scratch ed-out  earth 
was  exactly  like  vermilion,  moist  and 
brilliant  in  color — "a  ferruginous  soil," 
some  learned  person  said ;  but,  however 
that  may  be,  I  had  never  before  seen 
earth  of  such  a  bright  color,  for  it  was 
quite  different  from  the  red-clay  soil  one 
has  seen  here  and  in  other  places. 

The  line  of  country  we  followed  that 
morning  was  extraordinarily  pretty  and 
characteristic.  The  distant  purple  hills 
rolled  down  to  the  gently -undulating 
ground  over  which  we  rode.  Here  and 
there — would  that  it  had  been  oftener ! — 
a  pretty  homestead  with  its  sheltering 
trees  and  surrounding  patches  of  pale- 
green  forage  clung  to  the  steep  hillside 
before  us.  Then,  as  we  rode  on,  one 
of  the  ravines  fell  away  at  our  feet  to  a 
deep  gully,  through  which  ran  a  stream- 


let among  clustering  scrub  and  bushes. 
In  one  spot  the  naked  rock  stood  out 
straight  and  bare  and  bold  for  fifty  yards 
or  so,  as  though  it  were  the  walls  of  a 
citadel,  with  a  wealth  of  creeping  green- 
ery at  its  foot,  and  over  its  face  a  tiny 
waterfall,  racing  from  the  hill  behind, 
leapt  down  to  join  the  brook  in  the  gul- 
ly. We  saw  plenty  of  game,  too — part- 
ridges, buck,  two  varieties  of  the  bald- 
headed  ibis,  secretary-birds,  and,  most 
esteemed  of  all,  a  couple  of  paauw  (I 
wonder  how  it  is  spelt?),  a  fine  kind  of 
bustard,  which  is  quite  as  good  eating  as 
a  turkey,  but  daily  becoming  more  and 
more  scarce.  There  were  lots  of  plover, 
too,  busy  among  the  feathery  ashes  on 
the  newly-burned  ground,  and  smaller 
birds  chirruped  sweetly  every  now  and 
then.  It  was  all  exceedingly  delightful, 
and  I  enjoyed  it  all  the  more  for  the 
absence  of  the  blazing  sunshine,  which, 
however  it  may  light  up  and  glorify  the 
landscape,  beats  too  fiercely  on  one's 
head  to  be  pleasant.  If  only  we  women 
could  bring  ourselves  to  wear  pith  hel- 
mets, it  would  not  be  so  bad ;  but  with 
the  present  fashion  of  hats,  which  are 
neither  shade  nor  shelter,  a  ride  in  the 
sun  is  pretty  nearly  certain  to  end  in  a 
bad  headache.  At  all  events,  this  ride 
had  no  worse  consequence  than  making 
us  very  hungry  for  our  last  camp-meal, 
a  solid  luncheon,  and  then  there  was  just 
time  to  rush  down  the  hill  and  clamber 
into  the  post-cart  for  four  hours  of  gal- 
loping and  jolting  through  the  cold 
spring  evening  air.  My  last  look  was 
at  the  white  tents  of  the  pretty  camp,  the 
smoke  of  its  fires  and  the  smart  lines  of 
carbineers  and  mounted  rifles  assembling 
to  the  bugle-call  for  another  long  after- 
noon of  steady  drill  down  in  the  valley, 
or  "flat,"  as  it  is  called — a  picturesque 
and  pretty  glimpse,  recalling  the  mem- 
ory of  some  very  pleasant  hours,  the 
prettiest  imaginable  welcome,  and  a  great 
deal  of  hearty  and  genuine  hospitality. 


MARITZBURG,  September  i,  1876. 

I  HAVE  had  many  pleasant  cups  of 
tea  in  my  life,  indoors  and  out  of 
doors,  but  never  a  pleasanter  cup  than 
the  one  I  had  the  other  day  in  a  wagon, 
or,  to  speak  more  exactly,  by  the  side  of 
a  wagon — a  wagon,  too,  upon  which  one 
looked  with  the  deepest  respect,  for  it  had 
just  come  down  from  a  long  journey  up 
the  country,  where  it  had  been  trekking 
these  four  months  past— trekking  night 
and  day  right  up  to  the  territory  of  the 
Ama-Swazies,  through  the  Thorn  coun- 
try, over  hundreds  of  miles  of  these  end- 
less billowy  hills,  rolling  in  wearying  mo- 
notony day  after  day ;  but — and  this  "but" 
made  up  for  every  other  shortcoming — 
amid  hunting-grounds  happier  than  often 
fall  to  the  lot  of  even  the  South  African 
explorer.  And  there  were  the  spoils  of 
the  little  campaign  spread  out  before  us. 
The  first  result,  however,  which  struck 
me  was  the  splendid  health  of  the  trav- 
elers. Sunburned  indeed  they  were, 
especially  the  fair  young  English  girl- 
face  which  had  smiled  good-bye  to  me 
from  the  depths  of  a  sun-bonnet  last 
April.  But  who  would  not  risk  a  few 
shades  of  tan  to  have  gone  through  such 
a  novel  and  delightful  journey  ?  I  never 
saw  two  people  look  so  well  in  all  my 
life  as  this  adventurous  couple,  and  it 
was  with  one  voice  they  declared  they 
had  enjoyed  every  moment  of  the  time. 
And  what  a  pleasant  time  it  must  have 
been,  rewarded  as  they  were — and  de- 
served to  be — by  splendid  sport !  On 
the  fore  part  of  the  wagon  lay  a  goodly 
pile  of  skins  and  quantities  of  magnif- 
icent horns,  from  the  ponderous  pair  on 
the  shaggy  buffalo-skulls  down  to  taper 
points  which  might  have  belonged  to  a 
fairy  buck,  so  slender,  so  polished,  so  in- 
expressibly graceful,  were  they.  But  the 
trophy  of  trophies  was  the  skin  of  a  lion, 
which  had  been  shot  in  the  earliest  morn- 
ing light  some  twenty  yards  from  the 
hunter's  tent.  It  was  a  splendid  skin, 


and  the  curved  claws  are  to  be  made  into 
a  necklace  and  earrings  for  the  sports- 
man's wife,  who  indeed  deserves  them 
for  bearing  her  share  of  the  dangers  and 
discomforts  of  the  expedition  so  cheer- 
fully and  bravely.  It  was  very  difficult 
to  elicit  the  least  hint  of  what  the  dis- 
comforts were,  or  might  have  been,  until 
at  last  my  eager  questions  raked  out  an 
admission  that  a  week  of  wet  weather 
(the  only  one,  by  the  way,  in  all  the 
four  months)  was  tedious  when  cooped 
up  under  the  tilt  of  the  wagon,  or  that 
some  of  the  places  up  and  down  which 
the  lumbering,  unwieldy  conveyance  had 
crept  were  fearful  to  look  at  and  danger- 
ous to  travel,  necessitating  a  lashing  to 
gether  of  the  wheels  by  iron  chains,  as 
well  as  the  use  of  the  ordinary  heavy 
brake.  Yet  there  had  been  no  upset,  no 
casualty,  no  serious  trouble  of  any  sort ; 
and  I  think  what  these  English  travelers 
were  more  impressed  with  than  anything 
else  was  the  honesty  of  the  Kafirs.  The 
wagon  with  its  stores  of  food  and  wine, 
of  comforts  and  conveniences  of  all  sorts, 
had  been  left  absolutely  alone  by  the 
side  of  a  track  crossed  and  recrossed 
every  hour  by  Kafirs,  and  twenty  miles 
short  of  the  place  whither  the  tent  had 
been  carried  for  greater  facilities  of  get- 
ting at  the  big  game.  The  oxen  were 
twenty  miles  off  in  another  direction, 
under  no  one's  care  in  particular;  the 
wagon  stood  absolutely  alone ;  and  yet 
when  the  moment  of  reassembling  came 
every  bullock  was  forthcoming,  and  noth- 
ing whatever  of  any  description  was  miss- 
ing from  the  unguarded  wagon.  The 
great  attraction  to  the  Kafirs  along  the 
line  of  travel  had  been  the  empty  tins 
of  preserved  milk  or  jam  :  with  tops  and 
bottoms  knocked  out  they  made  the  most 
resplendent  bangles,  and  became  a  vio- 
lent fashion  up  among  the  Thorns. 

Nor  was  that  grand  lion's  skin  the  only 
one.      There  were  quagga   skins,  wolf 
skins,  buck  skins  of  half  a  dozen  differ- 
125 


126 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


ent  species,  eland  skins,  buffalo  skins, 
lynx  and  wild-cat  skins  enough  to  start 
a  furrier's  shop,  and  all  in  excellent  pres- 
ervation, having  been  tightly  pegged  out 
and  thoroughly  dried.  The  horns — or 
rather  the  skulls — were  still  a  little  high, 
and  needed  to  be  heaped  well  to  leeward 
before  we  settled  down  to  tea,  camping 
on  kegs  and  boxes  and  whatever  we  could 
find.  I  was  made  proud  and  happy  by 
being  accommodated  with  a  seat  on  the 
lion  skin ;  and  exactly  opposite  to  me, 
tranquilly  grazing  on  the  young  grass, 
was  the  identical  donkey  which  had  at- 
tracted the  king  of  animals  to  the  spot 
where  his  fate  awaited  him.  Although 
camped  in  the  very  heart  of  the  lion 
country,  the  hunter  had  neither  seen  nor 
heard  anything  of  his  big  game  until  this 
donkey  chanced  to  be  added  to  the  stud, 
and  then  the  lions  came  roaring  round, 
half  a  dozen  at  a  time.  A  huge  fire  had 
to  be  kept  up  night  and  day,  and  close 
to  this  the  unhappy  ass  was  tethered,  for 
his  life  would  not  have  been  worth  much 
otherwise ;  and  he  seems  to  have  been 
thoroughly  alive  to  the  perils  of  his  situ- 
ation. Lions  can  resist  anything  except 
ass-flesh,  it  appears ;  but  it  is  so  entirely 
their  favorite  delicacy  that  they  forget  their 
cunning,  and  become  absolutely  reckless 
in  pursuit  of  it.  When  at  the  last  ex- 
tremity of  terror,  the  poor  donkey  used 
to  lift  up  his  discordant  voice,  and  so 
keep  the  prowling  foe  at  bay  for  a  while, 
though  it  invariably  had  the  double  effect 
of  attracting  all  the  lions  within  earshot. 
And  so  it  was  that  in  the  early  dawn  the 
hunter,  hearing  the  lion's  growls  coming 
nearer  and  nearer,  and  the  poor  donkey's 
brays  more  and  more  frequent,  stole  out, 
rifle  in  hand,  just  in  time  to  get  a  steady 
shot  at  the  splendid  brute  only  fifteen 
yards  away,  who  was  hungrily  eyeing 
the  miserable  ass  on  the  other  side  of 
the  blazing  fire.  In  spite  of  all  legends 
to  the  contrary,  a  lion  never  attacks  a 
man  first,  and  this  lion  turned  and  moved 
away  directly  he  saw  the  sportsman's 
leveled  rifle.  Only  one  shot  was  fired, 
for  the  dull  thud  of  the  bullet  told  that 
it  had  struck  the  lion,  and  nothing  upon 
earth  is  so  dangerous  as  a  wounded  lion. 
The  huge  beast  walked  slowly  away,  and 


when  the  full  daylight  had  come  the 
sportsman  and  a  few  Kafirs  followed  up 
the  blood-flecked  trail  for  a  quarter  of  a 
mile,  or  less,  to  find  the  lion  lying  down 
as  if  asleep,  with  his  head  resting  on  his 
folded  fore  paw,  quite  dead.  I  don't 
think  I  ever  understood  the  weight  of 
a  lion  until  I  was  told  that  it  took  two 
strong  Kafirs  to  lift  one  of  its  ponderous 
fore  feet  a  few  inches  even  from  the 
ground,  and  it  was  almost  more  than  ten 
men  could  manage  to  drag  it  along  the 
ground  by  ropes  back  to  the  tent.  Twen- 
ty men  could  scarcely  have  carried  it, 
the  size  and  weight  of  the  muscle  are  so 
enormous.  The  Kafirs  prize  the  fat  of 
the  lion  very  highly,  and  the  headman 
of  the  expedition  had  claimed  this  as  his 
perquisite,  melting  it  down  into  gourds 
and  selling  it  in  infinitesimal  portions 
as  an  unguent.  I  don't  know  what  the 
market-price  up  country  was,  but  whilst 
we  were  laughing  and  chatting  over  our 
tea  I  saw  the  crafty  Kafir  scooping  out 
the  tiniest  bits  of  lion's  fat  in  return  for 
a  shilling.  One  of  my  Kafirs  asked 
leave  to  go  down  and  buy  some.  "What 
for,  Jack?"  I  asked.  "Not  for  me,  ma' 
— -for  my  brudder :  make  him  brave, 
ma' — able  for  plenty  fight,  ma'."  I  am 
certain,  however,  that  this  was  a  ruse, 
and  that  Jack  felt  his  own  need  of  the 
courage-giving  ointment. 

Talking  of  Jack,  reminds  me  of  a  visit 
I  had  the  other  day  from  a  detachment 
of  his  friends  and  relatives.  They  did 
not  come  to  see  Jack :  they  came  to  see 
me,  and  very  amusing  visitors  they  were. 
First  of  all,  there  was  a  bride,  who  brought 
me  a  young  hen  as  a  present.  She  was 
attended  by  two  or  three  scraggy  girls  of 
about  fifteen,  draped  only  in  short  man- 
tles of  coarse  cloth.  The  bride  herself 
was  exceedingly  smart,  and  had  one  of 
the  prettiest  faces  imaginable.  Her  reg- 
ular features,  oval  outline,  dazzling  teeth 
and  charming  expression  were  not  a  bit 
disfigured  by  her  jet-black  skin.  Her 
hair  was  drawn  straight  up  from  her  head 
like  a  tiara,  stained  red  and  ornamented 
with  a  profusion  of  bones  and  skewers, 
feathers,  etc.,  stuck  coquettishly  over  one 
ear,  and  a  band  of  bead  embroidery,  stud- 
ded with  brass-headed  nails,  being  worn 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


127 


like  a  fillet  where  the  hair  grew  low 
on  the  forehead.  She  had  a  kilt — or  se- 
ries of  aprons,  rather — of  lynx  skins,  a 
sort  of  bodice  of  calf  skin,  and  over  her 
shoulders,  arranged  with  ineffable  grace, 
a  gay  table  -  cover.  Then  there  were 
strings  of  beads  on  her  pretty,  shapely 
throat  and  arms,  and  a  bright  scarlet 
ribbon  tied  tight  round  each  ankle.  All 
the  rest  of  the  party  seemed  immensely 
proud  of  this  young  person,  and  were 
very  anxious  to  put  her  forward  in  every 
way.  Indeed,  all  the  others,  mostly  hard- 
working, hard-featured  matrons,  prema- 
turely aged,  took  no  more  active  part 
than  the  chorus  of  a  Greek  play,  always 
excepting  the  old  induna  or  headman  of 
the  village,  who  came  as  escort  and  in 
charge  of  the  whole  party.  He  was  a 
most  garrulous  and  amusing  individual, 
full  of  reminiscences  and  anecdotes  of 
his  fighting  days.  He  was  rather  more 
frank  than  most  warriors  who 

Shoulder  their  crutch  and  show  how  fields  are  won, 

for  the  usual  end  of  his  battle-stories  was 
the  na'ive  confession,  "And  then  I  thought 
I  should  be  killed,  and  so  I  ran  away." 
He  and  I  used  up  a  great  many  interpre- 
ters in  the  course  of  the  visit,  for  he  wea- 
ried every  one  out,  and  nothing  made 
him  so  angry  as  any  attempt  to  condense 
his  conversation  in  translating  it  to  me. 
But  he  was  great  fun — polite,  as  became 
an  old  soldier,  full  of  compliments  and 
assurances  that  "now,  the  happiest  day 
of  his  life  having  come,  he  desired  to 
live  no  longer,  but  was  ready  for  death." 
The  visit  took  place  on  the  shady  side  of 
the  verandah,  and  thither  I  brought  my 
large  musical-box  and  set  it  down  on  the 
ground  to  play.  Never  was  there  such 
a  success.  In  a  moment  they  were  all 
down  on  their  knees  before  it,  listening 
with  rapt  delight,  the  old  man  telling 
them  the  music  was  caused  by  very 
little  people  inside  the  box,  who  were 
obliged  to  do  exactly  as  I  bade  them. 
They  were  all  in  a  perfect  ecstasy  of 
delight  for  ever  so  long,  retreating  rap- 
idly, however,  to  a  distance  whenever  I 
wound  it  up.  The  old  induna  took  snuff 
copiously  all  the  time,  and  made  me  af- 
fectionate speeches,  which  resulted  in  the 


gift  of  an  old  great-coat,  which  he  as- 
sured me  he  never  should  live  to  wear 
out,  because  he  was  quite  in  a  hurry  to 
die  and  go  to  the  white  man's  land,  now 
that  he  had  seen  me.  We  hunted  up  all 
manner  of  queer  odds  and  ends  for  pres- 
ents, and  made  everybody  happy  in  turn. 
As  a  final  ceremony,  I  took  them  through 
the  house  :  tiny  as  it  is,  it  filled  them  with 
amazement  and  delight.  My  long  look- 
ing-glass was  at  once  a  terror  and  a  plea- 
sure to  them,  for  they  rather  feared  be- 
witchment ;  but  I  held  up  the  baby  to  see 
himself  in  it,  and  then  they  were  pacified, 
saying,  "The  chieftainess  never  would  go 
and  bewitch  that  nice  little  chieftain."  As 
usual,  the  pictures  were  what  they  most 
thoroughly  enjqyed.  Landseer's  prints 
of  wild  cattle  elicited  low  cries  of  recog- 
nition and  surprise:  "Zipi  in  korno !" 
("Behold  the  cows!")  My  own  favor- 
ite print  of  the  three  little  foxes  was 
much  admired,  but  pronounced  to  be 
"lill  catties."  The  bride  was  anxious  to 
know  why  I  kept  the  beds  of  the  estab- 
lishment on  the  floor  and  allowed  people 
to  walk  over  them.  She  did  not  consider 
that  a  good  arrangement  evidently ;  nor 
could  she  understand  how  matting  could 
be  of  any  use  except  to  sleep  on.  At 
last  it  became  time  for  "  scoff,"  and  they 
all  retired  to  partake  of  that  dainty,  the 
old  induna  having  begged  leave  to  kiss 
my  hands,  which  he  did  very  gallantly, 
assuring  me  he  had  never  been  so  happy 
before  in  all  his  life,  and  that  he  could 
quite  believe  now  what  I  had  told  him 
about  the  great  white  queen  over  the  sea 
being  just  as  careful  for  and  fond  of  her 
black  children  as  of  her  white  ones.  I 
made  a  great  point  of  this  in  my  con- 
versations with  him,  and  showed  them 
all  Her  Majesty's  picture,  to  which  they 
cried  "Moochlie!"  ("Nice!"),  and  gave 
the  royal  salute.  I  must  say  I  delight 
in  these  little  glimpses  of  Kafir  charac- 
ter ;  I  find  in  those  whom  I  come  across, 
like  my  visitors  of  last  week,  so  much 
simple  dignity  with  shrewd  common 
sense.  Their  minds,  too,  seem  pecu- 
liarly adapted  to  receive  and  profit  by 
anything  like  culture  and  civilization, 
and  there  certainly  is  a  better  founda- 
tion on  which  to  build  up  both  these 


128 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA, 


things  than  in  any  other  black  race  with 
which  I  am  acquainted. 

SEPTEMBER  15. 

Such  an  expedition  as  we  have  just 
made !  It  reminded  me  exactly  of  the 
dear  old  New  Zealand  days,  only  that  I 
should  have  been  sure  to  have  had  a  bet- 
ter horse  to  ride  in  New  Zealand  than 
here.  I  have  a  very  poor  opinion  of 
most  of  the  animals  here  :  anything  like 
a  tolerable  horse  is  rare  and  expensive, 
and  the  ordinary  run  of  steeds  is  ugly  to 
look  at,  ill-groomed  and  ill-favored,  be- 
sides not  being  up  to  much  work.  Upon 
this  occasion  I  was  mounted  on  a  coarse- 
ly-put-together chestnut,  who  was  broken 
in  to  carry  a  lady  a  few  evenings  ago 
whilst  I  was  getting  ready  for  my  ride. 
However,  beyond  being  a  little  fidgety 
and  difficult  to  mount,  owing  to  lurking 
distrust  of  my  habit,  he  has  no  objection 
to  carry  me.  But  he  is  as  rough  as  a 
cart-horse  in  his  paces,  and  the  way  he 
stops  short  in  his  canter  or  trot,  flinging 
all  his  legs  about  anywhere,  is  enough  to 
jolt  one's  spine  out  of  the  crown  of  one's 
head.  As  for  his  mouth,  it  might  as  well 
be  a  stone  wall,  and  he  requires  to  be 
ridden  tightly  on  the  curb  to  keep  him 
from  tripping.  When  you  add  to  these 
peculiarities  a  tendency  to  shy  at  every 
tuft  of  grass,  and  a  habit  of  hanging  the 
entire  weight  of  his  head  on  your  bridle- 
hand  as  soon  as  he  gets  the  least  bit 
jaded,  it  must  be  admitted  that  it  would 
be  easy  to  find  a  pleasanter  horse  for  a 
long,  hurried  journey.  Still,  on  the  prin- 
ciple of  all's  well  that  ends  well,  I  ought 
not  to  be  so  severe  on  my  steed,  for  the 
expedition  ended  well,  and  was  really 
rather  a  severe  tax  on  man  and  beast. 
This  is  the  way  we  came  to  take  it : 

Ever  since  I  arrived,  now  nearly  a 
year  ago,  I  have  been  hearing  of  a  cer- 
tain "bush"  or  forest  some  forty-five  or 
fifty  miles  away,  which  is  always  named 
when  I  break  into  lamentations  over  the 
utter  treelessness  of  Natal.  Latterly,  I 
have  had  even  a  stronger  craving  than 
usual  to  see  something  more  than  a  small 
plantation  of  blue  gums,  infantine  oaks 
and  baby  firs,  making  a  dot  here  and 
there  amid  the  eternal  undulation  of  the 


low  hills  around.  "Seven-Mile  Bush" 
has  daily  grown  more  attractive  to  my 
thoughts,  and  at  last  we  accepted  one 
of  many  kind  and  hospitable  invitations 

thither,  and  I  induced  F to  promise 

that  he  would  forego  the  dear  delight  of 
riding  down  to  his  barn-like  office  for  a 

couple  of  days,  and  come  with  Mr.  C 

and  me  to  the  "  bush."  This  was  a  great 
concession  on  his  part ;  and  I  may  state 
here  that  he  never  ceased  pining  for  his 
papers  and  his  arm-chair  from  the  mo- 
ment we  started  until  we  came  back. 

It  was  necessary  to  make  a  very  early 
start  indeed,  and  the  stars  were  still 
shining  when  we  set  off,  though  the  first 
sunbeams  were  creeping  brightly  and 
swiftly  over  the  high  eastern  hills.  It 
was  a  fresh  morning,  in  spite  of  the  oc- 
casional puff  of  dust -laden  air,  which 
seemed  to  warn  us  every  now  and  then 
that  there  was  such  a  thing  as  a  hot 
wind  to  be  considered,  and  also  that 
there  had  not  been  a  drop  of  rain  for 
these  last  five  months.  The  whole  coun- 
try seems  ground  to  powder,  and  the  al- 
most daily  hot  winds  keep  this  powder 
incessantly  moving  about ;  so  it  is  not 
exactly  pleasant  for  traveling.  We  pick- 
ed up  our  Kafir  guide  as  we  rode  through 
the  town,  and  made  the  best  of  our  way 
at  once  across  the  flats  between  this  and 
Edendale,  which  we  left  on  our  right, 
climbing  slowly  and  tediously  up  a  high 
hill  above  it;  then  down  again  and  up 
again,  constantly  crossing  clear,  cold, 
bright  rivulets  —  a  welcome  moment  to 
horse  and  rider,  for  already  our  lips  are 
feeling  swollen  and  baked  ;  across  stony 
reefs  and  ridges  cropping  out  from  bare 
hillsides ;  past  many  a  snug  Kafir  kraal 
clinging  like  the  beehives  of  a  giant  to 
the  side  of  a  steep  pitch,  with  the  long 
red  wagon-track  stretching  out  as  though 
for  ever  and  ever  before  us.  The  sun  is 
hot,  very  hot,  but  we  have  left  it  behind 
us  in  the  valleys  below,  and  we  sweep 
along  wherever  there  is  a  foothold  for 
the  horses,  with  a  light  and  pleasant  air 
blowing  in  our  faces.  Still,  it  is  with 
feelings  of  profound  content  that  at  the 
end  of  a  twenty-mile  stage  we  see  "Tay- 
lor's," a  roadside  shanty,  looking  like 
a  child's  toy  set  down  on  the  vast  flat 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


129 


around,  but  uncommonly  comfortable 
and  snug  inside,  with  mealie-gardens 
and  forage  -  patches  around,  and  more 
accommodation  than  one  would  have 
believed  possible  beneath  its  low,  thatch- 
ed eaves  from  the  first  bird's-eye  glance. 
The  horses  are  made  luxuriously  com- 
fortable directly  in  a  roomy,  cool  shed, 
and  we  sit  down  to  an  impromptu  break- 
fast in  the  cleanest  of  all  inn-parlors.  I 
have  no  doubt  it  would  have  been  a  very 
comprehensive  and  well-arranged  meal, 
but  the  worst  of  it  was  it  never  had  a 
chance  of  being  taken  as  a  whole.  What- 
ever edible  the  nice,  tidy  landlady  put 
down  on  her  snowy  cloth  vanished  like 
a  conjuring  trick  before  she  had  time  to 
bring  the  proper  thing  to  go  with  it.  We 
ate  our  breakfast  backward  and  forward, 
and  all  sorts  of  ways,  beginning  with 
jam,  sardines,  and  mustard,  varied  by 
eggs,  and  ending  with  rashers  of  bacon. 
As  for  the  tea,  we  had  drunk  up  all  the 
milk  and  eaten  the  sugar  by  the  time  the 
pot  arrived.  The  only  thing  which  at 
all  daunted  us  was  some  freshly-made 
boers'  bread,  of  the  color  of  a  sponge, 
the  consistency  of  clay  and  the  weight 
of  pig  iron.  We  were  quite  respectful 
to  that  bread,  and  only  ventured  to  break 
off  little  crusts  here  and  there  and  eat  it 
guardedly,  for  it  was  a  fearful  condiment. 
Still,  we  managed  to  eat  an  enormous 
breakfast  in  spite  of  it,  and  so  did  the 
horses;  and  we  all  started  in  highest 
condition  and  spirits  a  little  before  two 
o'clock,  having  had  more  than  a  couple 
of  hours'  rest.  After  riding  hard  for 
some  time,  galloping  over  every  yard  of 
anything  approaching  to  broken  ground, 
we  ventured  to  begin  to  question  our 
guide — who  kept  up  with  us  in  an  amaz- 
ing manner,  considering  the  prominence 
of  his  little  rough  pony's  ribs — as  to  the 
remaining  distance  between  us  and  "Sev- 
en-Mile Bush."  Imagine  our  horror  when 
he  crooked  his  hand  at  right  angles  to 
his  wrist,  and  made  slowly  and  distinct- 
ly five  separate  dips  with  it,  pointing 
to  the  horizon  as  he  did  so !  Now,  the 
alarming  part  was,  that  there  were  five 
distinct  and  ever-rising  ranges  of  hills 
before  us,  the  range  which  made  a  hard 
ridge  against  the  dazzling  sky  being  of 
9 


a  deep  and  misty  purple,  so  distant  was 
it.  We  had  been  assured  at  Taylor's 
that  only  twenty-five  miles  more  lay 
between  us  and  the  "bush,"  and  those 
mountains  must  be  now  at  least  thirty 
miles  off.  But  the  guide  only  grins  and 
nods  his  head,  and  kicks  with  his  bare 
heels  against  his  pony's  pronounced  ribs, 
and  we  hasten  on  once  more.  On  our 
right  hand,  but  some  distance  off,  rises 
the  dark  crest  of  the  Swartzkopf  Moun- 
tain, and  beneath  its  shadow,  extending 
over  many  thousand  acres  of  splendid 
pasture-ground,  is  what  is  known  as  the 
Swartzkopf  Location,  a  vast  tract  of  coun- 
try reserved — or  rather  appropriated — to 
the  use  of  a  large  tribe  of  Kafirs.  They 
dwell  here  in  peace  and  plenty,  and,  until 
the  other  day,  in  prosperity  too.  But  a 
couple  of  years  ago  lung-sickness  broke 
out  and  decimated  their  herds,  reducing 
the  tribe  to  the  very  verge  of  starva- 
tion and  misery.  However,  they  bat- 
tled manfully  with  the  scourge,  but  it 
gave  them  a  distrust  of  cattle,  and  they 
took  every  opportunity  of  exchanging 
oxen  for  horses,  of  which  they  now  own 
a  great  number.  What  we  should  have 
called  in  New  Zealand  "mobs  "  of  them 
were  to  be  seen  peacefully  pasturing 
themselves  on  the  slopes  around  us,  and 
in  almost  every  nook  and  hollow  nestled 
a  Kafir  kraal.  Here  and  there  were  large 
irregular  patches  of  brown  on  the  fast 
greening  hillsides,  and  these  straggling 
patches,  rarely  if  ever  fenced,  were  the 
mealie-gardens  belonging  to  the  kraals. 
By  four  of  the  clock  we  have  made 
such  good  way  that  we  can  afford  imme- 
diately after  crossing  Eland's  River,  a 
beautiful  stream,  to  "off  saddle  "  and  sit 
down  and  rest  by  its  cool  banks  for  a 
quarter  of  an  hour.  Then,  tightening 
up  our  girths,  we  push  off  once  more. 
It  has  been  up  hill  the  whole  way,  just 
excepting  the  sudden  sharp  descent  into 
a  deep  valley  on  the  farther  side  of  each 
range ;  but  the  increasing  freshness — 
nay,  sharpness — of  the  air  proved  to  us 
how  steadily  we  had  been  climbing  up 
to  a  high  level  ever  since  we  had  passed 
through  Edendale.  From  this  point  of 
the  journey  the  whole  scenic  character 
of  the  country  became  widely  different 


I30 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


from  anything  I  have  hitherto  seen  in 
Natal.  For  the  first  time  I  began  to  un- 
derstand what  a  wealth  of  beauty  lies 
hidden  away  among  her  hills  and  valleys, 
and  that  the  whole  country  is  not  made 
up  of  undulating  downs,  fertile  flats  and 
distant  purple  hills.  At  the  top  of  the 
very  first  ridge  up  which  we  climbed  after 
crossing  Eland's  River  a  perfectly  new 
and  enchanting  landscape  opened  out 
before  us,  and  it  gained  in  majesty  and 
beauty  with  every  succeeding  mile  of  our 
journey.  Ah  !  how  can  I  make  you  see 
it  in  all  its  grandeur  of  form  and  glory 
of  color  ?  The  ground  is  broken  up  ab- 
ruptly into  magnificent  masses  —  cliffs, 
terraces  and  rocky  crags.  The  hills  ex- 
pand into  abrupt  mountain-ranges,  ser- 
rated in  bold  relief  against  the  loveliest 
sky  blazing  with  coming  sunset  splen- 
dors. Every  cleft — or  kloof,  as  it  is  call- 
ed here  —  is  filled  with  fragments  of 
the  giant  forest  which  until  quite  lately 
must  have  clothed  these  rugged  moun- 
tain-sides. Distant  hill-slopes,  still  bare 
with  wintry  leanness,  catch  some  slant- 
ing sun-rays  on  their  scanty  covering  of 
queer,  reddish  grass,  and  straightway 
glow  like  sheets  of  amethyst  and  topaz, 
and  behind  them  lie  transparent  deep- 
blue  shadows  of  which  no  pigment  ever 
spread  on  mortal  palette  could  give  the 
exquisite  delicacy  and  depth.  Under 
our  horses'  feet  the  turf  might  be  off 
the  Sussex  downs,  so  close  and  firm  and 
delicious  is  it — the  very  thing  for  sheep, 
of  which  we  only  see  a  score  here  and 
there.  "  Why  are  there  not  more  sheep  ?" 
I  ask  indignantly,  with  my  old  squatter 
instincts  coming  back  in  full  force  upon 

me.     Mr.  C translates  my  question 

to  the  Kafir  guide,  who  grins  and  kicks 
his  pony's  ribs  and  says,  "  No  can  keep 
ship  here.  Plenty  Kafir  dog :  eat  up  all 
ships  two,  tree  day."  "Yes,  that  is  ex- 
actly the  reason,"  Mr.  C says,  "but 

I  wanted  you  to  hear  it  from  himself." 
And  ever  after  this,  I,  remembering  the 
dearness  and  scarcity  of  mutton  in  Ma- 
ritzburg,  and  seeing  all  this  splendid  feed 
growing  for  nothing,  look  with  an  eye 
of  extreme  disfavor  and  animosity  on 
all  the  gaunt,  lean  curs  I  see  prowling 
about  the  kraals.  Almost  every  Kafir 


we  meet  has  half  a  dozen  of  these  poach- 
ing-looking  brutes  at  his  heels,  and  it 
exasperates  me  to  hear  that  there  is  a 
dog  law  or  ordinance,  or  something  of 
that  sort,  "  only  it  has  not  come  into  op- 
eration yet."  I  wish  it  would  come  into 
operation  to-morrow,  and  so  does  every 
farmer  in  the  country,  I  should  think. 
Yes,  in  spite  of  this  fairest  of  fair  scenes 
— and  in  all  my  gypsy  life  I  have  never 
seen  anything  much  more  beautiful — I 
feel  quite  cross  and  put  out  to  think  of 
imaginary  fat  sheep  being  harried  by 
these  useless,  hideous  dogs. 

But  the  horses  are  beginning  to  go 
a  little  wearily,  and  gladly  pause  to  wet 
their  muzzles  and  cool  their  hoofs  in  ev- 
ery brook  we  cross.  I  am  free  to  confess 
that  I  am  getting  very  tired,  for  nothing 
is  so  wearying  as  a  sudden,  hurried  jour- 
ney like  this,  and  I  am  also  excessively 
hungry  and  thirsty.  The  sun  dips  down 
quite  suddenly  behind  a  splendid  confu- 
sion of  clouds  and  mountain-tops,  lights 
up  the  whole  sky  for  a  short  while  with 
translucent  masses  of  crimson  and  am- 
ber, which  fade  swiftly  away  into  stran- 
gest, tenderest  tints  of  primrose  and  pale 
green,  and  then  a  flood  of  clear  cold 
moonlight  breaks  over  all  and  bathes 
everything  in  a  differing  but  equally 
beautiful  radiance.  Three  ridges  have 
now  been  climbed,  and  the  pertinacious 
guide  only  dips  his  hand  twice  more  in 
answer  to  my  peevish  questions  about 
the  distance.  Nay,  he  promises  in  won- 
derful Dutch  and  Kafir  phraseology  to 
show  me  the  "baas's"  house  (whither 
we  are  bound)  from  the  very  next  ridge. 
But  what  a  climb  it  is  !  and  what  a  pan- 
orama do  we  look  down  upon  from  the 
topmost  crag  before  commencing  the 
steep  descent,  this  time  through  a  bit 
of  dense  forest !  It  is  all  as  distinct  as 
day,  and  yet  there  is  that  soft,  ineffable 
veil  of  mystery  and  silence  which  moon- 
light wraps  up  everything  in.  We  look 
over  immense  tree-tops,  over  plains  which 
seem  endless  beneath  the  film  of  evening 
mist  creeping  over  them,  to  where  the 
broad  Umkomanzi  rushes  and  roars 
amid  great  boulders  and  rocks,  leaping 
every  here  and  there  over  a  crag  down 
to  a  lower  level  of  its  wide  and  rocky 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


bed.  In  places  the  fine  river  widens 
out  into  a  mere,  and  then  it  sleeps  tran- 
quilly enough  in  the  moonlight,  making 
great  patches  of  shimmering  silver  amid 
the  profound  shadows  cast  by  hill  and 
forest.  Beyond,  again,  are  mountains, 
always  mountains,  and  one  more  day's 
journey  like  this  would  take  us  into 
Adam  Kop's  Land.  As  we  look  at  it 
all  now,  it  does  indeed  seem  "a  sleepy 
world  of  dreams;"  but  in  another  mo- 
ment the  panorama  is  shut  out,  for  we 
are  amid  the  intense  darkness  of  the  for- 
est-path, stepping  carefully  down  what 
resembles  a  stone  ladder  placed  at  an  an- 
gle of  45°.  Of  course  I  am  frightened, 
and  of  course  my  fright  shows  itself  in 
crossness  and  in  incoherent  reproaches. 
I  feel  as  if  I  were  slipping  down  on  my 
horse's  neck ;  and  so  I  am,  I  believe. 
But  nobody  will  "take  me  off,"  which  is 
what  I  earnestly  entreat.  Both  my  gen- 
tlemen retain  unruffled  good-humor,  and 
adjure  me  "not  to  think  about  it,"  coup- 
led with  assurances  of  perfect  safety.  I 
hear,  however,  a  great  deal  of  slipping 
and  sliding  and  rolling  of  displaced 
rocks  even  after  these  consoling  an- 
nouncements of  safety,  and  orders  are 
given  to  each  weary  steed  to  "hold  up;" 
which  orders  are  not  at  all  reassuring. 
Somebody  told  me  somewhere — it  seems 
months  ago,  but  it  must  have  been  early 
in  the  afternoon — that  this  particular  and 
dreadful  hill  was  only  three-quarters  of  a 
mile  from  the  "baas's;"  so  you  may  im- 
agine my  mingled  rage  and  disappoint- 
ment at  hearing  that  it  was  still  rather 
more  than  three  miles  off.  And  three 
miles  at  this  stage  of  the  journey  is 
equal  to  thirteen  at  an  earlier  date.  It 
is  wonderful  how  well  the  horses  hold 
out.  This  last  bit  of  the  road  is  almost 
flat,  winding  round  the  gentlest  undula- 
tion possible,  and  it  is  as  much  as  I  can 
do  to  hold  the  chestnut,  who  has  caught 
sight  evidently  of  twinkling  lights  there 
under  the  lee  of  that  great  wooded  cliff. 
No  sound  can  ever  be  so  delightful  to  a 
wearied  and  belated  traveler  as  the  bark 
of  half  a  dozen  dogs,  and  no  greeting 
more  grateful  than  their  rough  caresses, 
half  menace  and  half  play.  But  there  is  a 
much  warmer  and  more  cordial  welcome 


waiting  for  us  behind  the  sako  bono  of 
the  dogs,  and  I  find  myself  staggering 
about  as  if  the  water  I  have  been  drink- 
ing so  freely  all  day  had  been  something 
much  stronger.  On  my  feet  at  last  in 
such  a  pretty  sitting-room!  Pictures, 
books,  papers,  all  sorts  of  comforts  and 
conveniences,  and,  sight  of  joy !  a  tea- 
table  all  ready,  even  to  the  tea-pot,  which 
had  been  brought  in  when  the  dogs  an- 
nounced us.  If  I  had  even  sixpence  for 
every  cup  of  tea  I  drank  that  evening,  I 
should  be  a  rich  woman  to  the  end  of  my 
days.  As  for  the  milk,  deliciously  fresh 
from  the  cow,  it  was  only  to  be  equaled 
by  the  cream  ;  and  you  must  have  lived 
all  these  months  in  Natal  before  you  can 
appreciate  as  we  did  the  butter,  which 
looked  and  tasted  like  butter,  instead  of 
the  pale,  salt,  vapid  compound,  as  much 
lard  as  anything  else,  for  which  we  pay 
three  shillings  and  sixpence  a  pound  in 
Maritzburg,  and  which  has  been  cost- 
ing six  shillings  in  Port  Elizabeth  all  this, 
winter. 

It  is  always  a  marvel  to  me,  arriving 
at  night  at  these  out-of-the-way  places, 
which  seem  the  very  Ultima  Thule  of 
the  habitable  globe,  how  the  furniture, 
the  glass  and  china,  the  pictures  and  or- 
naments and  books,  get  there.  How  has 
anybody  energy  to  think  of  transporting 
all  these  perishable  articles  over  that 
road?  Think  of  their  jolting  in  a  bul- 
lock-wagon down  that  hill !  One  fancies 
if  one  lived  here  it  must  needs  be  a  Rob- 
inson-Crusoe existence ;  instead  of  which 
it  is  as  comfortable  as  possible ;  and  if 
one  did  not  remember  the  distance  and 
the  road  and  the  country,  one  might  be 
in  England,  except  for  the  Kafir  boys, 
barefooted  and  white-garmented,  some- 
thing like  choristers,  who  are  gliding 
about  with  incessant  relays  of  food  for 
us  famished  ones.  The  sweet  little  gold- 
en-haired children,  rosy  and  fresh  as  the 
bough  of  apple-blossoms  they  are  play- 
ing with,  the  pretty  chatelaine  in  her 
fresh  toilette,  —  all  might  have  been 
taken  up  in  a  beneficent  fairy's  thumb 
and  transported,  a  moment  ago,  from 
the  heart  of  civilization  to  this  its  far- 
thest extremity.  As  for  sleep,  you  must 
slumber  in  just  such  a  bed  if  you  want 


I32 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


to  know  what  a  good  night's  rest  is,  and 
then  wake  up  as  we  did,  with  all  memo- 
ries of  the  long,  wearying  day's  jour- 
ney clean  blotted  out  of  one's  mind, 
and  nothing  in  it  but  eagerness  not  to 
lose  a  moment  of  the  lovely  fresh  and 
cool  day  before  us.  Even  the  sailing 
clouds  are  beautiful,  and  the  shadows 
they  cast  over  the  steep  mountains,  the 
broad  rivers  and  the  long  dark  belt  of 
forest  are  more  beautiful  still.  Of  course, 
the  "bush  "  is  the  great  novelty  to  us  who 
have  not  seen  a  tree  larger  than  a  dozen 
years'  growth  could  make  it  since  we 
landed ;  and  it  is  especially  beautiful 
just  now,  for  although,  like  all  native 
forests,  it  is  almost  entirely  evergreen 
(there  is  a  more  scientific  word  than 
that,  isn't  there?),  still,  there  are  patches 
and  tufts  of  fresh  green  coming  out  in 
delicate  spring  tints,  which  show  vividly 
against  the  sombre  mass  of  foliage.  But 
oh,  I  wish  they  had  not  such  names ! 
Handed  down  to  us  from  our  Dutch 
predecessors,  they  must  surely  have  got 
changed  in  some  incomprehensible  fash- 
ion, for  what  rhyme  or  reason,  what  sense 
or  satire,  is  there  in  such  a  name  as  "can- 
nibal stink-wood"? — applied,  too,  to  a 
graceful,  handsome  tree,  whose  bark 
gives  out  an  aromatic  though  pungent 
perfume.  Is  it  not  a  libel  ?  For  a  tree 
with  a  particularly  beautifully  -  veined 
wood,  of  a  deep  amber  color,  they  could 
think  of  no  more  poetical  or  suggestive 
name  than  simply  "  yellow-wood  :"  a  tree 
whose  wood  is  of  a  rich  veined  brown, 
which  goes,  too,  beautifully  with  the  yel- 
low-wood in  furniture,,  is  merely  called 
"iron-wood,"  because  it  chances  to  be 
hard;  and  so  forth. 

Before  going  to  the  "bush,"  however, 
we  consider  ourselves  bound  to  go  and 
look  at  the .  great  saw-mill  down  by  the 
Umkomanzi,  where  all  these  trees  are 
divided  and  subdivided,  cut  into  lengths 
of  twenty  feet,  sawn  into  planks,  half  a 
dozen  at  a  time,  and  otherwise  changed 
from  forest  kings  to  plain,  humdrum  piles 
and  slabs  and  posts  for  bridges,  roof- 
trees,  walls,  and  what  not.  There  is  the 
machinery  at  work,  with  just  one  ripple, 
as  it  were,  of  the  rushing  river  turned 
aside  by  a  little  sluice,  to  drive  the  great 


wheel  round  and  set  all  the  mysterious 
pistons  and  levers  moving  up  and  down  in 
their  calm,  monotonous  strength,  doing 
all  sorts  of  miraculous  things  in  the  most 
methodical,  commonplace  manner.  I 
was  much  struck  by  the  physiognomy  of 
the  only  two  white  men  employed  about 
this  mill.  There  were  some  assistant 
Kafirs  of  course,  but  these  two  in  their 
widely-different  ways  were  at  once  repel- 
lent and  interesting.  One  of  them  was, 
I  think,  the  biggest  man  I  ever  saw.  To 
say  that  he  looked  like  a  tall  tree  him- 
self among  his  fellows  is  to  give  you, 
after  all,  the  best  idea  of  his  enormous 
height  and  powerful  build.  He  moved 
huge  logs  about  with  scarcely  an  effort, 
and  it  was  entirely  for  his  enormous  phys- 
ical strength  that  our  host  kept  him  in 
his  place.  I  did  not  need  to  be  told  he 
was  one  of  the  most  persistent  and  con- 
sistent bad  characters  imaginable,  for  a 
single  glance  at  his  evil  countenance  was 
enough  to  suggest  that  he  could  hardly 
be  a  very  satisfactory  member  of  society. 
He  had  only  one  eye,  and  about  as  hang- 
dog, sullen,  lowering  a  countenance  as 
one  would  see  out  of  the  hulks.  His 
"mate"  was  a  civil,  tidy,  wizen-looking, 
elderly  man,  who  might  have  appeared 
almost  respectable  by  the  side  of  the 
bigger  villain  if  his  shaking  hand  and 
bleared,  restless  eyes  had  not  told  his 
story  plainly  enough.  Still,  if  he  could 
only  be  kept  out  of  temptation  the  old 
man  might  be  trusted ;  but  our  host  con- 
fessed that  he  did  not  half  like  retaining 
the  services  of  the  other,  and  yet  did  not 
know  where  to  find  any  one  who  would 
or  could  do  his  work  so  easily  and  ad- 
mirably. It  is  almost  impossible  to  get 
any  men  to  come  and  live  up  here,  so 
far  away  from  their  fellow-creatures  and 
from  everything  except  their  work;  so 
one  has  to  put  up  with  a  thousand  draw- 
backs in  the  service  one  is  able  to  pro- 
cure. I  was  glad  when  we  turned  our 
backs  upon  that  villainous-looking  giant 
arid  strolled  beneath  a  perfect  sun  and 
sky  and  balmy  air  toward  the  lowest 
kloof  or  cleft  where  the  great  "bush" 
ran  down  between  two  steep  spurs.  The 
grass  of  the  downs  over  which  we  walk- 
ed had  all  the  elasticity  of  tread  of  turf 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


to  our  feet,  but  they  ended  abruptly  in  a 
sort  of  terrace,  under  which  ran  a  noisy, 
chattering  brooklet  in  a  vast  hurry  to 
reach  the  Umkomanzi  over  yonder.  It 
is  easy  to  scramble  down  among  the  tan- 
gle of  ferns  and  reeds  and  across  the 
boulders  which  this  long  dry  winter  has 
left  bare,  and  so  strike  one  of  the  Bush- 
men's paths  without  difficulty,  and  get 
into  the  heart  of  the  forest  before  we 
allow  ourselves  to  sit  down  and  look 
around  us.  How  wonderfully  poetical 
and  beautiful  it  all  is ! — the  tall,  stately 
trees  around  us,  with  their  smooth  mag- 
nificent boles  shooting  up  straight  as  a 
willow  wand  for  sixty  feet  and  more  be- 
fore putting  forth  their  crown  of  lofty 
branches,  the  more  diminutive  under- 
growth of  gracefulest  shrubs  and  plumy 
tufts  of  fern  and  lovely  wild  flowers — 
violets,  clematis,  wood-anemones  and  he- 
paticas — showing  here  and  there  a  mod- 
est gleam  of  color.  But  indeed  the  very 
mosses  and  lichens  at  our  feet  are  a 
week's  study,  and  so  are  the  details  of 
the  delicate  green  tracery  creeping  close 
to  the  ground.  The  trees,  the  actual 
great  forest  trees,  are  our  delight,  how- 
ever, and  we  never  weary  of  calling  to 
each  other  to  "come  and  look  at  this 
one,"  extemporizing  measuring  -  lines 
from  the  endless  green  withies  which 
hang  in  loops  and  festoons  from  the 
higher  branches.  Thirty  feet  round  five 
feet  from  the  ground  is  not  an  uncom- 
mon measurement,  and  it  is  half  sad, 
half  amusing  to  see  how  in  an  hour  or 
so  we  too  begin  to  look  upon  everything 
as  timber,  to  call  the  most  splendid  trees 
"blocks"  (the  woodman's  word),  and  to 
speculate  and  give  opinions  as  to  the  best 
way  of  "falling"  the  beautiful  stems. 
Up  above  our  heads  the  foliage  seems 
all  interlaced  and  woven  together  by  a 
perfect  network  of  these  monkey  ropes 
— a  stout  and  sturdy  species  of  Kane, 
really — such  as  I  have  seen  swinging 
from  West  India  forest  trees.  Here 
they  are  actually  used  as  a  sort  of  tra- 
peze by  the  troops  of  baboons  which 
live  in  these  great  woods,  coming  down 
in  small  armies  when  the  mealies  are 
ripe,  and  carrying  off  literally  armsful 
of  cobs.  The  Kafirs  dread  the  baboons 


more  than  anything  else,  and  there  is  a 
regular  organized  system  of  warfare  be- 
tween them,  in  which  the  baboons  by  no 
means  get  the  worst.  I  heard  a  sicken- 
ing story  of  how  only  last  season  the 
Kafirs  of  a  kraal  close  by,  infuriated 
by  their  losses,  managed  to  catch  an  old 
baboon,  leader  of  his  troop,  and  skinned 
him  and  let  him  go  again  into  the  woods. 
It  is  too  horrible  to  think  of  such  cruelty, 
and  it  seemed  a  blot  upon  the  lovely 
idyllic  scene  around  us.  All  the  wild 
animals  with  which  the  bush  was  teem- 
ing until  a  very  few  years  ago  are  grad- 
ually being  driven  farther  and  farther 
back  into  the  highest  part,  which  has 
not  yet  been  touched  by  axe  or  hatchet. 
There  are  still  many  kinds  of  buck,  how- 
ever— we  saw  three  splendid  specimens 
grazing  just  outside — besides  other  game. 
It  must — not  so  long  ago,  either — have 
been  the  quiet  forest  home  of  many  a 
wild  creature,  for  there  are  pits  now  to 
be  seen,  one  of  which  we  came  across 
with  sharp  stakes  at  the  bottom,  dug  to 
trap  elephants,  whose  bones  lie  there  to 
this  day.  Tigers  also  have  been  seen, 
and  panthers  and  leopards,  but  they 
grow  scarcer  every  year.  The  aborig- 
inal inhabitants  of  the  border  country 
beyond,  the  little  Bushmen — the  lowest 
type  of  human  creatures — used  to  come 
down  and  hunt  in  great  numbers  here  in 
this  very  spot  where  we  are  sitting,  and 
traces  of  their  ingenious  methods  of 
snaring  their  prey  are  to  be  seen  in 
many  places. 

As  I  sat  there,  with  the  tinkle  of  the 
water  in  my  ears,  sole  break  in  the 
"charmed  silence"  around,  I  could  not 
make  up  my  mind  which  was  the  most 
enchanting,  to  look  up  or  down  —  up  to 
where  the  tenderest  tint  of  cobalt  blue 
showed  through  the  flicker  of  green 
leaves  nearly  a  hundred  feet  above  us, 
and  where  a  sudden  terror  among  the 
birds  drove  them  in  bright  -  plumaged 
flight  from  bough  to  bough  ;  or  down  on 
the  ground  among  the  delicious  brown 
leaves  and  wonderful  minutiae  of  dimin- 
utive tendril  and  flower.  Here  and  there 
were  fallen  crimson  and  yellow  leaves, 
riveting  the  eye  for  a  moment  by  their 
vivid  glow,  or  the  young  fronds  of  a  rare 


134 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


fern  over  yonder  are  pushing  up  their 
curled  horns  of  pale  green.  A  month 
hence  it  will  be  all  carpeted  with  wild 
flowers,  and  the  heaths  will  be  spires  of 
tiny  bells.  There  is  also  a  coarse  but 
sweet  grass,  growing  luxuriantly,  on 
which  the  cattle  love  to  feed  when  all 
the  herbage  outside  is  parched  and  burn- 
ed to  the  very  root. 

As  I  read  over  what  I  have  written,  I 
am  filled  with  a  deep  disgust  to  perceive 
how  impossible  it  has  been  for  me  to 
catch  even  the  faintest  reflection  of  the 
charm  of  that  forest-glade — how  its  sub- 
tle beauty  is  not,  by  any  poor  words  of 
mine,  to  be  transferred  to  paper — how 
its  stillness  and  its  life,  its  grandeur  and 
its  delicate  pretti nesses,  the  aroma  of  the 
freshly-cut  logs,  the  chirrup  of  the  cica- 
las, the  twitter  of  the  birds,  all,  all  escape 
me.  Yet  I  shall  have  failed  indeed  if  I 
have  not  been  able  to  convey  to  you  that 
it  was  a  delicious  hour,  and  that  I  enjoy- 
ed every  moment  of  it.  I  am  only  a  wo- 
man, so  I  was  content  to  sit  there  plait- 
ing a  crown  of  ferns,  and  thinking  how 
I  should  tell  you  all  about  it  some  day, 
perhaps.  My  companions  conversed  to- 
gether, and  their  talk  was  entirely  about 
killing  something — "sport"  they  called 
it — how  best  they  could  get  a  shot  at 
those  graceful  bucks  over  yonder ;  what 
a  pity  the  close  season  had  begun  ;  what 
partridges  there  were;  when  the  wild- 
ducks  would  come  down  to  that  large 
mere  shining  in  the  distance;  whether 
there  were  any  wild  -  pigeons ;  how  far 
into  the  unexplored  bush  one  must  pen- 
etrate to  get  a  shot  at  a  panther ;  and  so 
forth.  It  seemed  a  desecration  to  talk 
of  taking  life  on  such  a  heavenly  morn- 
ing, and  I  was  glad  when  it  all  ended  in 
a  project  of  a  fishing-excursion  after  a 
late  luncheon. 

As  we  found  we  should  be  obliged  to 
start  early  to-morrow  morning,  I  decided 
to  stay  at  home  and  rest  this  afternoon  ; 
and  I  did  not  regret  my  resolution,  for 
it  was  very  pleasant  by  the  fire,  and  our 
beautiful  morning  turned  into  a  raw,  cold 
drizzle.  But,  as  the  people  about  here 
say,  it  has  really  forgotten  how  to  rain, 
and  it  is  more  like  a  Scotch  mist  than 
anything  else.  Whatever  it  may  be  call- 


ed, it  blots  out  mountain  and  forest  and 
river,  and  causes  the  fishing -excursion 
to  turn  into  the  dismalest  failure.  Next 
morning,  too,  when  we  start  after  break- 
fast, we  are  all  glad  of  our  waterproofs 
(what  should  I  do  without  my  ulster?), 
and  the  ground  is  as  slippery  as  though 
it  had  been  soaped.  Our  farewells  are 
made,  and  we  declare  that  we  have  no 
need  of  our  Kafir  guide  again,  though  I 
confess  to  misgivings  as  to  how  we  are 
to  find  our  road  through  so  thick  a  mist. 
It  has  also  been  decided,  for  the  sake  of 
the  horses,  to  take  them  only  as  far  as 
Taylor's  to-night,  and  so  break  the  jour- 
ney. But  the  question  is,  Shall  we  ever 
find  Taylor's?  for  it  is  a  little  off  the 
track,  and  we  cannot  see  five  yards 
to  our  right  hand  or  our  left.  We  are 
obliged  to  go  very  slowly,  and  there  are- 
places,  steep  up  and  down  hill,  where  in 
spite  of  precaution  and  picking  out  grass 
or  stones  to  go  over,  our  horses'  feet  fly 
from  under  them,  and  we  each  in  our 
turn  come  down  on  the  damp  red  clay 
in  an  awkward  sprawl.  However,  we  do 
not  disgrace  ourselves  by  tumbling  off, 
and  my  poor  habit  fares  the  worst,  for 
the  chestnut  always  seems  to  pick  him- 
self up,  in  some  odd  way,  by  its  help ; 
and  the  process  is  not  beneficial  to  it. 
Eland's  River  is  crossed  early  in  the  af- 
ternoon, and  then,  slippery  or  not,  we 
are  forced  to  push  on,  for  it  seems  as 
though  it  intended  to  be  pitchy  dark  by 
four  o'clock,  and  the  mist  turns  into  a 
thick,  fine  rain.  At  last,  about  half-past 
four,  we  hear  on  our  left  the  joyful  sound 
of  barking  dogs  and  crowing  cocks,  and 
the  horses  of  their  own  accord  show  a 
simultaneous  desire  to  turn  off  the  track, 
to  which,  with  its  guiding  wagon-wheels, 
we  have  so  persistently  clung.  If  it  be 
not  Taylor's  —  if  it  turns  out  that  these 
sounds  come  only  from  a  Kafir  kraal — 
then  indeed  I  don't  know  what  we  shall 
do,  for  we  can  never  find  the  track  again. 
It  is  an  anxious  moment,  and  Taylor's  is 
so  small  and  so  low  that  we  are  as  likely 
as  not  to  ride  right  over  it ;  but  no,  there 
is  a  wagon,  and  behind  the  wagon,  and 
not  much  higher,  is  a  thatched  roof,  and 
under  that  thatched  roof  are  warmth  and 
food  and  shelter  and  a  warm,  cordial 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


'35 


welcome ;  all  of  which  good  things  we 
are  enjoying  in  five  minutes'  time.  As 
for  the  horses,  they  are  rubbed  down 
and  put  to  stand  in  a  warm  shed,  with 
bedding  up  to  their  knees  and  a  perfect 
orgie  of  mealies  and  green  forage  before 
them  in  boxes.  Let  us  hope  they  enjoy- 
ed the  contrast  between  indoors  and  out 
of  doors  as  much  as  we  did.  At  all 
events,  they  were  freshness  itself  next 
morning,  when  we  made  another  start 
— not  quite  so  early,  for  only  the  lesser 
half  of  our  long  journey  lay  before  us, 
and  the  flood  of  sunshine  made  it  worth 
while  to  wait  a  little  and  let  the  soapy 
clay  tracks  have  a  chance  to  get  dry. 
It  was  exquisitely  fresh  and  balmy 
about  nine  o'clock,  when,  after  a  capital 
breakfast,  we  did  start  at  last,  and  the 
well -washed  hills  had  actually  put  on 
quite  a  spring-green  tint  since  we  passed 
them  a  couple  of  days  ago  from  yester- 
day's long  looked-for,  much-wanted  rain. 
I  went  through  many  anxieties,  however, 
on  that  return  journey,  because  my  two 
companions,  who  were  in  the  most  tear- 
ing, school-boy  spirits,  insisted  on  leav- 
ing the  road  with  its  guiding  marks  of 
wagon-wheels,  as  well  as  every  landmark 
to  which  I  fondly  clung,  and  taking  me 
across  country,  over  hill  and  dale,  through 
swampy  hollows  and  over  rocky  goat- 
paths,  until  I  was  quite  bewildered  and 
thoroughly  incredulous  as  to  where  we 
should  emerge.  It  is  true  that  the  dark 
crest  of  Swartzkopf  lay  steadily  to  our 
left,  just  where  it  should  be,  but  I  inva- 
riably protested  we  were  all  wrong  when 
I  had  any  leisure  or  breath  to  do  any- 
thing but  "hold  on  with  my  eyelids  "  up 
and  down  hill.  At  last  we  climbed  up 
our  last  hill-face,  and  there,  below  us, 
literally  smiling  in  the  sunshine,  lay  the 
pretty  little  mission  settlement  of  Eden- 
dale.  We  were  exactly  where  we  want- 
ed, topographically  speaking,  to  be,  but 
between  us  and  Edendale  the  mountain 
dropped  sheer  down,  as  it  seemed  to  me, 
and  naught  but  a  goat-path  was  there. 
"  Of  course  we  are  going  to  get  off  and 
lead  our  horses  down,"  I  fondly  hope. 
No  such  thing!  I  can't  very  well  get 
off  by  myself,  for  the  precipice  is  so  sheer 
that  I  should  certainly  drop  down  a  hun- 


dred feet  or  so.     F steadily  declines 

to  "take  me  off,"  and  begins  to  slip  and 
slither  down  the  track  on  horseback.  I 
feel  my  saddle  getting  into  all  sorts  of 
odd  positions,  and  I  believe  I  am  seated 
on  my  horse's  ears,  although  I  lean  back 
until  I  can  nearly  touch  his  tail.  It  is 
really  horrible.  I  get  more  and  more 

cross  every  moment,  and  scold  F 

and  reproach  Mr.  C furiously  all  the 

way  down,  without  eliciting  the  smallest 
sign  of  remorse  from  either.  But  it  is 
very  difficult  to  remain  cross  when  once 
we  have  reached  the  foot  of  that  cruel 
descent,  for  it  is  all  inexpressibly  lovely 
and  calm  and  prosperous  that  beautiful 
spring  morning.  Everybody  seems  busy, 
and  yet  good-humored.  The  little  black 
children  grinned  and  saluted  on  their 
way  to  school;  the  elders  cried  "Sako 
bono,  inkosa !"  as  they  looked  up  from 
their  basket  -  plaiting  or  their  wagon- 
making  ;  the  mill  -  wheel  turned  mer- 
rily with  a  busy  clatter  inexpressibly 
cool  and  charming ;  the  numerous  fowls 
and  ducks  cackled  and  quacked  as  they 
scuttled  from  under  our  horses'  feet. 
We  rode  down  the  main  street,  with  its 
neat  row  of  unburnt  brick  houses  on 
either  hand,  across  a  little  river,  and  so, 
under  avenues  of  syringas  whose  heavy 
perfume  filled  the  delicious  air,  out  into 
the  open  country  once  more.  It  is  near- 
ly a  dead  level  between  this  and  Maritz- 
burg,  and  the  road  is  in  good  order  after 
the  long  winter  drought ;  so  we  make 
the  best  of  our  way,  and  hardly  draw 
rein  until  we  are  under  the  lee  of  the 
hill  on  which  Fort  Napier  stands.  Here 
is  a  villainous  bit  of  road,  a  perfect  study 
of  ingenuity  as  to  cross-drains,  holes  and 
pitfalls  generally;  so  the  horses  take 
breath  once  more  for  an  easy  canter 
down  the  quiet  straight  streets  of  the 
sleepy  little  Dutch  town.  Our  cottage 
lies  beyond  it  and  across  the  river,  but 
it  is  still  early,  hardly  noon  in  fact,  when 
we  pull  up  at  our  own  stable-door,  and 
the  horses  seem  every  whit  as  fresh  and 
in  as  good  condition  as  when  we  started, 
yet  they  have  gone  close  upon  one  hun- 
dred miles  from  first  to  last, 

Over  hill,  over  dale, 
Through  brush,  through  brier. 


136 


LETTERS  FROM  SOUTH  AFRICA. 


SEPTEMBER  25. 

I  declare  I  have  not  said  anything 
about  the  weather  for  a  long  time.  I 
cannot  finish  mere  appropriately  than 
by  one  of  my  little  meteorological  re- 
ports. The  skies  are  trying  to  remem- 
ber how  to  rain ;  we  have  every  now 
and  then  a  cold,  gray  day — a  day  which 
is  my  particular  delight,  it  is  so  like  an 
English  one;  then  rain  more  or  less 
heavy,  and  an  attempt  at  a  thunder- 
storm. The  intervening  days  are  bright- 
ly glaring  and  exceedingly  hot.  Every- 
thing is  bursting  hurriedly  and  luxuriant- 
ly into  bloom ;  my  scraggy  rose-bushes 
are  thickly  covered  with  buds,  which 


blow  into  splendid  roses  after  every 
shower ;  the  young  oaks  are  a  mass  of 
tender,  luxuriant  green,  and  even  the 
unpoetical  blue  gums  try  hard  to  assume 
a  fresh  spring  tint ;  the  fruit  trees  look 
like  large  bouquets  of  pink  blossom, 
and  the  laquot  trees  afford  good  sport 
for  G in  climbing  and  stone- throw- 
ing. On  the  veldt  the  lilies  are  pushing 
up  their  green  sheaths  and  brilliant  cups 
through  the  still  hard  ground,  the  black 
hill-slopes  are  turning  a  vivid  green,  and 
the  weeds  are  springing  up  in  millions  all 
over  my  field-like  flower-beds.  Spring  is 
always  lovely  everywhere,  but  nowhere 
lovelier  than  in  "fair  Natal." 


J.  B.  LIPPINCOTT  &  CO.,  PHILADELPHIA. 


DOROTHY  FOX. 

By  LOUISA  PARR,  author  of  "  Hero  Carthew," 
etc.  With,  numerous  Illustrations.  8vo. 
Paper  cover,  75  cents.  Extra  cloth,  $1.25. 

"  Such  an  artist  is  the  author  of  '  Dorothy  Fox,' 
and  we  must  thank  her  for  a  charming  novel. 
The  story  is  dramatically  interesting,  and  the 
characters  are  drawn  with  a  firm  and  graceful 
hand.  The  style  is  fresh  and  natural,  vigorous 
without  vulgarity,  simple  without  mawkishness. 
Dorothy  herself  is  represented  as  charming  all 
hearts,  and  she  will  charm  all  readers.  .  .  We 
wish  'Dorothy  Fox'  many  editions."  —  London 
Times. 

"One  of  the  best  novels  of  the  season." — 
Philadelphia  Press. 

"  It  is  admirably  told,  and  will  establish  the  repu- 
talion  of  the  author  among  novelists." — Albany 
Argus. 

JOHN  THOMPSON,  BLOCKHEAD, 

And  Companion  Portraits.    By  LOUISA  PARR, 
author  of  "Dorothy  Fox."      I2mo.     With 
Frontispiece.     Extra  cloth.     $1.7$. 
"  Extremely  well-told  stories,  interesting  in  char- 
acters and  incidents,  and  pure  and  wholesome  in 
sentiment." — Boston  Watchman  and  Reflector. 

"They  are  quite  brilliant  narrative  sketches, 
worthy  of  the  reputation  established  by  the  writer." 
— Philadelphia  Inquirer. 

WHY  DID  HE  NOT  DIE? 

Or,  The  Child  from  the  Ebraergang.     From 
the  German  of  AD.   VON  VOLCKHAUSEN. 
By  Mrs.  A.  L.  WISTER,  translator  of  "  Old 
Mam'selle's  Secret,"    "Gold   Elsie,"  etc. 
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larity.    From  the  beginning  to  the  end  the  interest 
never   flags,   and   the   characters  and  scenes  are 
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Herald. 

THE  DAUGHTER  OP  AN  EGYPTIAN 

KING.  An  Historical  Romance.  Translated 
from  the  German  of  GEORGE  EBERS  by 
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York  World. 

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time." — Boston  Evening  Traveller. 


AT  THE  ALTAR. 

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NER, author  of  "Hermann,"  "The  Hero 
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tion."— Boston  Gazette. 

"NOT  PRETTY,  BUT  PRECIOUS," 

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MUST  IT  BE? 

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DETLEF.  By  MS.,  translator  of  "  By  His 
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ARTICLE  47. 

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POPULAR  WORKS  OF  FICTION 

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At  Odds.     By  BARONESS  TAUTPHCEUS,  author  of  "  The 

Initials,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Beatrice  Boville,  and  other  Stories.    By  "OuiDA," 

author  of  "Puck,"  etc.    12mo.     Cloth.   $1.50. 
Be"be"e.     A  Story.     By  "  OUIDA,"  author  of  "  Strath- 
more,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Beyond  the   Breakers.     By  Hon.  R.  D.  OWEN. 

Illustrated.    8vo.    Cloth.    $1.50.    Paper.    $1.00. 
Breaking  a  Butterfly.     By  the  author  of  "  Guy 

Livingstone."    Illustrated.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
By  His  Own  Might.     By  the  author  of  "Only  a 

Girl."    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Cecil  Castlemaine's  Gage,  and  other  Stories.    By 

"  OUIDA."    12uio.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Chandos.    A  Novel.    By  "  OUIDA,"  author  of  " Idalia," 

etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Children   of    the    Abbey.      By   RECIINA   MARIA 

ROCHE.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.00. 
Countess  Gisela.    After  the  German  of  E.  Marlitt, 

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Daisy.     By  the  author  of  "  The  Wide,  Wide  World." 

12mo.    Cloth.    $2.00. 
Dallas  Galbraith.     A  Novel.    By  Mrs.  R.  H.  DAYIS. 

8vo.    Cloth.    $1.50.    Paper.    $1.00. 
Dollars  and  Cents.     By  the  author  of  "  Queochy," 

etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Dolores.      A  Novel.      By  Mrs.  FORRESTER,  author  of 

"  Diana  Carew."    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Dorothy  Fox.     By  LOUISA  PARS.    Illustrated.    8vo. 

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Folle-Farine.     A  Novel.     By  "OUIDA,''  author  of 

"Strathuiore,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Gil  Bias  of  Santillane.    From  the  French  of  LK 

SAGE.    12n.o.    Cloth.    $1.00. 
Gold  Elsie.    From  the  German  of  B.  Marlitt,  by  Mrs. 

A.  L.  WISTER.    16mo.    Fine  cloth.    $1.50. 
Granvilie  de  Vigne.      By  "OUIDA,"  author  of 

"Idalia,"  "Puck,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Green  Gate  (The).     After  the  German  of  Wichert,  by 

Mrs.  WISTKR.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Hulda.     A  Romance.     From  the  German.     By  Mrs. 

WISTER.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Idalia.      A  Novel.      By  "OuiDA,"  author  of  "Under 

Two  Flags,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Leaf  in  the    Storm  (A),  and  other  Stories.     By 

"  OUIDA."    Illustrated.    8vo.    Paper.    50  cents. 
Life  and  Adventures   of  a  Country  Mer- 
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Little   Moorland    Princess   (The).      After  the 

German  of  E.  Marlitt,  by  Mrs.  A.  L.  WiaiKR.    12mo. 

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Magdalena.     From  the  German  of  E.  Marlitt.    Illus- 
trated.   8vo.    Paper.    35  cents. 
Malcolm.    By  GEORGE  MACDONALD.  8vo.  Cloth.  $1.50. 

Paper.    $1.00. 
Old  Mam'selle's  Secret  (The).    After  the  German. 

By  Mrs.  A.  L.  WISTER.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Only  a  Girl.     A  Romance.    After  the  German.    By 

Mrs.  A.  L.  WISTEB.    12mo.    Cloth.    $2.00. 
Over    Yonder.     From  the  German  of  E.  Marlitt 

Illustrated.    8vo.    Paper.    30  cents. 
Pascarel.      A   Romance.      By   "OuiDA,"  author  of 

"  Idalia,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Puck.     A  Novel.     By  "  OUIDA,"  author  of  "Idalia," 

"  Strathmore,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $2.00. 
Queechy.    By  the  author  of  "  The  Wide,  Wide  World." 

12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Quits.     A  Novel.     By  BARONESS  TAUTPHOIUS,  author 

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Randolph  Gordon,  and  other  Stories.  By  "  OUIDA," 

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Strathmore ;  or,  Wrought  by  his  Own  Hand.     By 

" OUIDA"    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Say  and  Seal.     A  Novel.     By  the  author  of  "The 

Wide,  Wide  World,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $2.00. 
Scottish    Chiefs.      An    Historical   Romance.      By 

JANE  PORTER.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.00. 
Second  Wife  (The).   From  the  German  of  E.  Marlitt, 

by  Mrs.  WISTER.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Signa.    A  Romance.     By  "  OUIDA,"  author  of  "  Under 

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Thaddeus  of  "Warsaw.     An  Historical  Romance. 

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Thrown   Together.     By  FLORENCE  MONTGOMERY. 

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Tricotrin.    A  Novel.    By  '•  OUIDA,"  author  of  "Puck," 

etc.    With  Portrait.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.50. 
Tristram  Shandy.     By  LAURENCE  STERNE.     12mo. 

Cloth.    $1.00. 
Twofold  Life  (A).     A  Romance.    By  the  author  of 

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Under  Two  Flags.    A  Novel.   By  "OUIDA,"  author 

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War  Path  (The).   By  J.B.JONES.   Illustrated.   12mo. 

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Why  did  He  not  Die  P     After  the  German.     By 

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Wide,  Wide  World  (The).   A  Tale.    By  the  author 

of  "Queechy,"  etc.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.75. 
Wild  Western  Scenes.     By  J.  B.  JONES.    Illus- 
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Cast  Up  by  the  Sea.     By  Sir  SAKUEL  W.  BAKER. 

Illustrated.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
Deep  Down.     A  Tale  of  the  Mines.    By  R.  M.  BAL- 

LANTYNE.    Illustrated.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
Dick  Rodney ;  or,  Adventures  of  an  Eton  Boy.     By 

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Eastern  Fairy  Legends.    Collected  by  M.  FKERE. 

Illustrated.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
Enchanting  and  Enchanted.    Fairy  Tales  from 

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12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 

Erling  the  Bold.     By  M.  R.  BALLANTTNI.     Illus- 
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Eva's  Adventures  in  Shadowland,  and  the 

Merman.    Illustrated.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
fire  Brigade  (The).     A  Tale  of  London.    By  R.  M. 

BALLANTYNE.    Illustrated.    12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
Prank  Wildman's  Adventures  on  Land  and 

Water.    By  GERSTAECKER.    Illus.    12mo.    Cloth.   $1.25. 
Heroic  Life;   or,  Pictures  of  Heroes.     Illustrated. 

12mo.    Cloth.    $1.25. 
Mark  Seaworth.     A  Tale  of  the  Indian  Ocean,    ^y 

W.  H.  G.  KINGSTON.    Illustrated.   12mo.    Cloth.   $1.25. 


IQOOBIJS. 

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Peter  the  Whaler.    By  W.  H.  G.  KINGSTON.    Illus- 
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Ranald   Bannerman's   Boyhood.     By  GEOROB 
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Round  the  World.    By  W.  H.  G.  KINGSTON.    Illus- 
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Tiger    Prince    (The);   or,  Adventures  in  Abyssinia. 
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Wild  Sports  in  the  Far  West.     By  FREDERICK 
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Young  Islanders  (The) ;  or,  The  School-Boy  Cn 
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VALUABLE  WORKS  OF  REFERENCE. 


Allibone's  Dictionary  of  Prose  Quotations. 
By  S.  AUSTIN  ALLIBONK,  LL.D.  With  Indexes.  8vo. 
Extra  cloth.  85.00. 

Allibone's  Dictionary  of  Poetical  Quota- 
tions. By  S.  AUSTIN  ALUBONE,  LL.D.  With  Indexes. 
8vo.  Extra  cloth.  $5.00. 

Chambers's  Encyclopaedia.  American  Revised 
Edition.  A  Dictionary  of  Useful  Knowledge.  Pro- 
fusely Illustrated  with  Maps,  Plates,  and  Woodcuts. 
10  Tols.  Royal  8vo. 

Lippincott's  Pronouncing  Biographical 
Dictionary.  Containing  complete  and  concise  Bio- 
graphical Sketches  of  the  Eminent  Persons  of  all  Ages 
and  Countries.  By  J.  THOMAS,  A.M.,  M.D.  Imperial 
8vo.  Sheep,  $15.00.  2  vols.  Cloth,  $22.00. 

Allibone's  Critical  Dictionary  of  Authors. 
A  Dictionary  of  English  Literature  and  British  and 
American  Authors,  Living  and  Deceased.  By  S.  AUS- 
TIN ALLIBONE,  LL.D.  3  vols.  Imperial  8vo.  Extra 
cloth.  $22.50. 

Lippincott's  Pronouncing  Gazetteer  of  the 
World.  A  Complete  Geographical  Dictionary.  By  J. 
THOMAS  and  T.  BALDWIN.  Boyal  8vo.  Sheep.  $10.00. 


Chambers's  Book  of  Days.  A  Miscellany  of  Popu- 
lar Antiquities  connected  with  the  Calendar.  Profusely 
Illustrated.  2  vols.  8vo.  Ex  tra  cloth.  $8.00. 

Critical  Commentary.  A  Commentary,  Critical, 
Experimental,  and  Practical,  on  the  Old  and  New  Tes- 
taments. By  Drs.  JAMIESON,  FAUSSET,  and  BROWN. 
With  16  Maps  and  Plans.  6  vols.  Royal  8vo.  Extra 
cloth.  $30.00. 

Dictionary  of  Quotations,  from  the  Greek,  Latin, 
and  Modern  Languages.  With  an  Index.  Crown  8vo. 
Extra  cloth.  $2.00. 

Purness's  Concordance  to  Shakespeare's 
Poems.  An  Index  to  Every  Word  therein  contained, 
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cloth.  $4.00. 

Lempriere's  Classical  Dictionary,  containing 
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quity and  the  Ancients,  with  a  Chronological  Table. 
8vo.  Sheep,  $3.75.  16mo.  Cloth,  $1.50. 

Scott's  Commentary  on  the  Bible.  Contain- 
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vations, References,  Indexes,  etc.  3  vols.  Royal  8vo 
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POPULAR  STANDARD  WORKS, 

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Ancient  Classics  for  English  Readers.  Em- 
bracing the  Distinguished  Authors  of  Greece  and 
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Cloth.  $1.00  per  vol.  In  set  of  10  vols.  in  box.  Extra 
cloth.  $15.00. 

Bigelow's  Life  of  Benjamin  Franklin.  Writ- 
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ings. By  Hon.  JOHN  BIQKLOW.  3  vola.  With  Portrait. 
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